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OPIUM poppy cultivation nearly doubled in Southwest Asia in 2003- with the bulk of the crop now cultivated in Afghanistan.

The year-end total was 61,000 hectares of opium poppy, potentially yielding 2,865 metric tons of opium gum or 337 metric tons of heroin, said the International Narcotics Control Strategy Report-2003 released Monday by the Bureau for International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs.

The other 90-plus percent of the world's estimated opium gum production takes place in Afghanistan and Burma, with Afghanistan accounting for nearly 80 percent of that figure. Each country offers unique challenges to opium poppy control.

In Afghanistan, where a young government is recovering from the aftermath of war and a quarter-century of political misrule and economic chaos, "poppy eradication is physically and politically difficult."

Rugged terrain, and attacks by remnants of the Taliban regime present daily obstacles to the extension of government authority throughout the country, the report adds.

Perspective

For more than a decade, opium poppy has been Afghanistan's largest and most valuable cash crop. Taxes on the Afghan drug trade provided revenue to the Taliban regime and offered a degree of funding relief to a dysfunctional political regime that spent limited amounts on the populace.

Until the final years of the regime, it ignored opium planting and used a tax on opium production and transportation and taxes on the transportation of heroin to prop up the regime.

International pressure - and most likely a market glut of opium and heroin—led the Taliban to impose a poppy ban in 2000-2001, after which cultivation all but ceased. Drug stockpiles, however, continued to flow through traditional smuggling routes.

Leading Supplier

Now Afghanistan has re-emerged as the world's leading supplier of illicit opium, morphine, and heroin, with opium growing in 28 of the country’s 32 provinces.

The USG estimates the 2002-2003 crop at 61,000 hectares, nearly twice the estimate for the previous year.

The International Monetary Fund calculates that the opium trade makes up between 40-60 percent of Afghanistan's GDP, with the farmers receiving approximately $1 billion a year and another $1.3 billion to processors and traffickers.

"It is difficult to estimate precisely how much is earned from the narcotics trade and other illicit activities. The world financial community has only limited ability to track money that moves through the underground hawala system. However, given the street price of these drugs in Europe and further east, estimates of hundreds of millions of dollar are not out of order."

The report adds that "some of these proceeds may help fund elements hostile to the government of Afghanistan.

Eliminating the opium crop without provoking extreme political and economic reactions poses one of the most serious drug control dilemmas the allied coalition faces."

The Overview-2003

The overview for 2003, states that U.S. Government's international drug control programs made a "remarkable progress in 2003- despite a "perfect storm" of conditions potentially favoring international criminal activity - the aftermath of war, violent insurgency, political turmoil, economic disruption, and endemic corruption—we further narrowed the global drug trade’s field of operations.

"Our long-standing, international campaign to curb the flow of cocaine and heroin to the United States advanced significantly in 2003.

Together with our allies we limited drug crop expansion, strengthened interdiction efforts, destroyed processing facilities, and weakened major trafficking organizations. We furnished our partners critical training assistance to strengthen their law enforcement and judicial systems, while helping them reduce drug consumption in their own countries."

"We persuaded many once-reluctant governments to use the powerful instrument of extradition to deny notorious drug criminals the national safe haven they could once count on.

Closer cooperation among governments and financial institutions has been sealing off the loopholes that have allowed the drug trade to legitimize its enormous profits through sophisticated money laundering schemes.

The Toxic Drugs

The drugs that threaten the United States are cocaine, heroin, marijuana, and synthetic amphetamine-type stimulants (ATS). Cutting off their supply has been, and will continue to be, our principal international counter narcotics goal. Although U.S. consumption has been on the wane recently, cocaine remains U.S.'s "greatest concern."

An estimated 300 metric tons or more of cocaine HCl enter the U.S. annually, aggravating addiction, fueling crime, and harming the economic and social health of the United States. Since all cocaine originates in the Andean countries of Colombia, Peru, and Bolivia, we have devoted a significant portion of our resources to eliminating coca cultivation, disrupting cocaine production, and keeping it from reaching the United States.

Challenges for Pakistan

The chapter on Pakistan, stated "even with the provision of air and ground mobility and communications capacity through the border security program, Pakistan will face an immense challenge in the coming year to interdict the increasing supply of drugs from Afghanistan that pass through an extensive and permeable border into Pakistani territory."

"The Government of Pakistan (GOP) and the U.S. Government (USG) will need to work together to develop a strategy to utilize new resources wisely, increase coordination among the eleven agencies that have counter narcotics responsibilities, and put training to best use.

US to Co-operate

In coordination with the border security program, the U.S. will work with the GOP to put greater emphasis on the development of drug intelligence as it directly relates to trans-border trafficking activity and to target kingpin smuggling operations."

"Continued efforts to streamline and reform law enforcement, to investigate and prosecute corruption, and to speed up the pace of the counter narcotics judicial process will also be key to greater success against the drug trade in the future.

The United States will continue to work with the GOP to expedite extradition requests and to strengthen Pakistan's ability to attack money laundering, particularly by encouraging the passage of money laundering legislation that meets both UN and Financial Action Task Force standards."