Pros and cons for legalizing Afghan opium plantations
By Alexander Zelichenko*, TCA contributor
BISHKEK (TCA). Legalization of opium poppy growth in Afghanistan has
been frequently suggested as a way to solve the Afghan drug problem.
This idea is presented as an alternative to drug expansion and a panacea
for countries that use and transit drugs, including Kyrgyzstan.
Afghanistan has monopolized the world's heroin production, delivering
about 95 percent of all heroin consumed worldwide. The growth of opium
poppy, which is the raw material for heroin, makes up to 40 percent of
Afghanistan's GDP and involves 15 percent of the country's population.
In 2005, Afghanistan produced 4,400 tons of raw opium, which was enough
to produce 440 tons of heroin.
According to experts, 60 percent of Afghan drugs go through Iran to
Turkey and on to Europe through the restored Balkan route. The remaining
40 percent go to Russia through Central Asian countries. As of the
middle of May 2006, Tajik border guards alone had seized almost a ton of
drugs, including 426 kilograms of heroin.
The increasing drug traffic from Afghanistan has made it possible to
use the term "drug aggression," which poses a number of threats to the
national security of Russia and Central Asian countries.
The Afghan government of Hamid Karzai is now trying to solve the
problem of drug production. The country has established a Ministry to Fight
Drugs, and at a forum in London last February the Afghan anti-narcotic
minister said they reduced opium growing by 20 percent in 2005.
"Governors of Afghan provinces now help law enforcement authorities to
destroy opium plantations," said the minister. "Their contribution to
fighting drugs is sometimes the main indicator of their loyalty and ability
to govern a province."
However, in specialists' opinion, the growing of opium poppy could be
stopped by economic incentives, not by force. According to World Bank
experts in Kabul, as soon as authorities stop the cultivation of opium
poppy in one part of Afghanistan, opium plantations immediately appear
in other parts of the country. Experts believe that if Afghanistan
miraculously puts an end to growing opium poppy, this business will soon
flourish in other countries.
Drug dealers make tremendous profits due to the difference (as much as
100-fold) between drug prices in consumer countries and in Afghanistan.
These high revenues make it very difficult to use economic methods in
fighting the illegal growth of opium poppies. Economic incentives will
work only if revenues from the legal sectors of Afghan agriculture
exceed opium revenues three times. This is impossible in Afghanistan with
its ruined infrastructure.
Along with using the forceful methods of an anti-narcotic jihad, the
Afghan government is implementing a daring experiment: they have
significantly restricted the import of grain crops to provoke local peasants
into growing grain. The government has also launched a saffron project,
suggesting that Afghans grow saffron instead of opium poppy. Saffron
costs as much as opium - $750 per a kilogram.
There are proposals to allow Afghanistan to grow opium poppy for
medical purposes with the UN's permission, as India is doing now. However,
the Afghan government is against this solution, believing that this step
will finally corrupt the country, mar its international image, and kill
any incentive to develop economy and agriculture.
In Soviet times, Kyrgyzstan legally cultivated high quality opium poppy
for medical purposes, producing up to 16 percent of the global market.
In 1974, Kyrgyzstan stopped growing opium poppy in compliance with a UN
decision. In the early 1990s, after gaining independence, some Kyrgyz
scholars and officials suggested legalizing the cultivation of opium
poppies in an effort to revive the country's ailing economy. "We have
grown opium poppy for decades and used it to cure all diseases, but we
have not had any drug users," they claimed. At that time the Kyrgyz
government had enough common sense and wisdom not to slip to a cheap
populism and false patriotism. "If our opinion is not heard and opium poppy
growing is restored, the Interior Ministry will decline all
responsibility for the country's future!" said the then Interior Minister Feliks
Kulov (now the Prime Minister of Kyrgyzstan).
In 1991, Kyrgyzstan established an expert group to analyze the cost
efficiency of the possibly restoring opium poppy growth. The experts came
to the conclusion that it was "more profitable to grow potatoes." At
that time there were strict quotas for buying opium for medical needs
and there was an overproduction of opium. Moreover, there are synthetic
analgesics that cause no addiction.
India, which produces legal opium in much lesser amounts than illegal
Afghan opium, now faces problems with its sales. If opium poppy growth
is ever legalized, Afghanistan will easily increase its annual
production to 20,000 tons. There were reports that, after receiving
compensation for each hectare of voluntarily destroyed opium poppy plantations,
Afghans extended their plantations ten times the following year to get
more money for another voluntary destruction.
Legalization in Afghanistan may also make neighboring countries start
legal opium production in an effort to improve their economic situation.
What if Tajikistan, possibly followed by Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan,
begins growing opium poppies?