Afgan Poppy crop down 40%

[Trajan]

I see so, this is good news....but there is still that 60% out there..whats up with that? no lefties screaming like they did over the central amercian 'drugs' in the 80's?

 

[hjmick]

You said poopy crop.

At least she didn't say Poopycock. Now that is Comedy gold.

She probably meant "poppycock" and just misspelled it...

 

[Truthmatters]

hey someone fixed my shitty spelling.

thanks

 

[hjmick]

Damn, I missed "poopy crop?"

I need to quit my job...

 

[Sherry]

hey someone fixed my shitty spelling.

thanks

Damn, who's the party pooper??

 

[Jos]

Did she just say Puppy cock?

 

[ima]

Poppies down 40%? Is that supposed to be good or bad?

 

[BrutalTruth]

If you didn't see it with your own eyes, it didn't happen. I know what can be seen right here in the good old USA all day long though. Addicts being "given" heroin by clinics so they don't get sick or die from withdraw. If you are dumb enough to believe that the government here in the USA would let poppies/heroin benefit the income of the Taliban or terrorist cells, but not have the mentality that they should make sure they get that same funding themselves instead to stay on top of the game, what kind of thinker would you consider yourself.....

I mean it's not like they allow alcohol to be legal and take a huge cut in taxes, or cigarettes doing the exact same thing. It's not like they are paid to get weed off the street, and then double charge you again when the mysteriously can't do that job either and you get caught with it.

The american government will always have their hands in every toxic drug that hits the streets. The only question is how they can make the most money from it when it happens, and how to get the public to shut up about it. With the drugs that cause the most problems physically, they site behind the scenes, and collect. With the drugs that people support more, they tax and allow. That way they look like a crowd pleaser while always making that money.

They wanted to invade entire nations over the "possibility" of "chemical warfare". Drugs are chemicals in many cases, as is the cancerous threat in tobacco, and yet....there is no war declared on it?

The fact is "chemical warfare" disguised in the form of drugs kills enough people yearly to equate comparably to a year of war like casualties.

They don't take care of the issue, because they instigate it, and have a hand in it.

What would make more sense.... spend absolute billions of dollars to send people over seas because someone "might" be thinking about chemical warfare, or take the money given by the tax payers, and actually do the job that you are being paid to do right here?

It won't stop, because they simply don't want it to.

 

[Trajan]

oh wow, so let me see if I get this; the other 60% is...what?

Its hands off, thats what. By silent decree.

I have seen several debates here on the cia and SOA advisers etc. assisting or turning their heads ( which they did as in turn their heads) while cocaine was grown and moved thru central & south america(s) and Reagan was excoriated for 'allowing it', yet here we are


has it occurred to anyone ( other than the poster above me) that we have made deals that allows friendly tribes to continue to grow and ship/transship poppy in/out of Afghanistan?

same Geo-poltical BS, different decade. But now its time to laud it......

 

[Politico]

Aww they can't make as many drugs. Sniff...

 

[ima]

Aww they can't make as many drugs. Sniff...

Not to worry, they have about a 10 year supply stashed and ready to go.

 

[waltky]

One-fourth of the opium grown is grown in Myanmar...

UN report: Opium cultivation rising in Burma
31 October 2012 - Burma accounts for 25% of opium grown in the world

Opium growing has increased in Burma for a sixth year running despite eradication efforts, a UN report says. The UN Office on Drugs and Crime said land used for opium had risen by 17% this year, from nearly 40,000 hectares (100,000 acres) to 51,000 hectares. Burma is the second largest opium grower in the world after Afghanistan. Almost all of the opium it produces is grown in Shan and Kachin states, which have seen longstanding conflict between the military and ethnic rebel groups.

'Toxic combination'

Citing figures from the Burmese government, the report said almost 24,000 hectares of poppy fields had been eradicated in 2012 - about four times the figure in 2011. Gary Lewis, UNODC representative in South East Asia, said the situation on the ground was "very complex". In areas where opium was grown, there was ''a toxic combination of guns, money and drugs'', he said. The army and rebel fighters often profit from allowing the trade to continue. Farmers, meanwhile, say the instability means they have little choice but to continue growing the lucrative poppy plant - which is used to make heroin. Burma accounts for 25% of opium grown in the world, while Laos accounts for 3%, said the report, entitled the South East Asia Opium Survey 2012.

In Laos, land used to grow opium increased almost four-fold between 2007 and 2012 to 6,300 hectares. The recent rise contrasts with the situation from 1998 to 2006, when both Burma and Laos saw big drops - with an 83% reduction in the case of Burma. Most of Burma's opium is refined into heroin - about half goes to meet the growing market in China, with the rest being sold across South East Asia. Part of the reason for the sustained growth in the cultivation of this crop is the demand for heroin in Asia, said the report.

But the good news, in the case of Burma, was that there was now ''momentum to find the solution'', Mr Lewis said. There is support from President Thein Sein's government, which has embarked on a series of reforms. Ceasefires and political opening up also meant that international organisations such as the UN now have better access to the areas. The Golden Triangle - where Burma, Thailand and Laos meet - has been notorious for opium and drug smuggling for decades.

BBC News - UN report: Opium cultivation rising in Burma

 

[RoccoR]

Truthmatters, et al,

This is a statistical slight of hand.

Afghan poppy crops down 40% since '08 as key towns secured

(COMMENT)

This information is spread-out over a 5 year period. It is an effort to show success in the War on Drugs effort.

It tends to make people think that a reduction is actually working in our best interest; which it may not be.

Afghanistan’s area of poppy cultivation has increased by 7 per cent compared to the last year and more provinces cultivate poppy than then. This is the gist of annual opium survey for the country for 2012. There are no predictions about how many (thousands of) tons this will be. And the publishers – the UN and the government in Kabul – have changed their take on the drivers of poppy cultivation, away from poverty only. Doris Buddenberg(*) looks at why this is the case, at the data in general and interprets the survey’s interpretations.
SOURCE: The Afghanistan Analysts Network (AAN) / Afghanistan’s Fluctuating Poppy Production: More Than a Poverty Problem
Reference: Losing the war on poppies - Salon.com

On Tuesday the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) released its annual report on the worldwide prevalence of drugs -- according to usage, production, and transportation (ET, Reuters). The report predicted that 2012 would see a large blight in poppy crops in Afghanistan, causing worldwide opium and heroin prices to increase. Nearly half of Afghanistan's poppy crops were lost to plant disease in 2010, but output returned to normal levels in 2011 after yields increased 61 percent. But as UNODC Executive Director Yuri Fedotov noted: "We may anticipate that this year there will be another plant disease -- maybe not to the same scale as 2010 -- but (it) still may affect, especially in the southern part of Afghanistan, poppy cultivation." Despite the anticipated decline, the report also highlighted that between $27 and $30 billion worth of drugs annually are smuggled out of Afghanistan through Pakistan, while $1.5 billion stays in Pakistan.
SOURCE: U.N. predicts decrease in Afghanistan's poppy production by Tom Kutsch | The AfPak Channel

One has to be careful when they are evaluating this type of information. The decline in 2010 was due to a crop disease and much less from the impact of the opium eradication effort. The fields affected by the disease are not yet healthy and this is leading to an expansion of the fields (increase in area cultivation). More provinces are involved in poppy planting and harvesting opiates. It should be noted that there are no wealthy provinces which are not growing poppies and there are no poor provinces which are growing poppies. This has not gone unnoticed by Afghan Farmers.

Most Respectfully,
R

 

[waltky]

Roccor wrote: The decline in 2010 was due to a crop disease...

Mebbe dat crop disease...

... was caused by paraquat.

 

[ima]

We should send them Nancy Reagan, she can simply tell them to say no to drugs. It worked in the US, didn't it?

 

[waltky]

Afghans are growing more opium poppies than ever before...

Surging Afghan poppy crop threatening reconstruction
June 10, 2014 ~ Afghans are growing more opium poppies than ever before, and it's threatening to wipe out gains made to help the impoverished country improve health, education and governance, the U.S. watchdog for spending in Afghanistan said Tuesday.

John Sopko, the special inspector general for Afghan reconstruction, told a House subcommittee that the narcotics trade is tainting the financial sector, stoking corruption, helping Taliban insurgents and criminal networks. He said there already are signs that elements within the Afghan security forces are making arrangements with rural populations to permit opium poppy growing as a way to build local patronage networks. "The expanding cultivation and trafficking of drugs is one of the most significant factors putting the entire U.S. and international donor investment in the reconstruction of Afghanistan at risk," he said in prepared remarks. "Meanwhile, the United States and other donor nations assisting Afghanistan have, by and large, made counter-narcotics programming a lower strategic priority at the same time that the 2014 drawdown of U.S. and coalition forces increases the security risks in the country."

The U.N. Office of Drugs and Crime said Afghanistan produced almost $3 billion in opium plus its heroin and morphine derivatives last year — up more than the $2 billion produced the year before. From 2002 through March of this year, the U.S. had provided more than $7 billion for counter-narcotics efforts and agriculture stabilization programs, an important component of the U.S. strategy to curb opium poppy production. That's jeopardizing U.S. reconstruction programs at a time when the U.S. military is withdrawing troops, which is making it more difficult for aid workers to visit rebuilding sites and oversee programs. "On my trips to Afghanistan in 2013 and earlier this year, no one at the (U.S.) Embassy could convincingly explain to me how the U.S. government counter-narcotics efforts are making a meaningful impact on the narcotics trade or how they will have a significant impact after" the U.S.-led combat mission ends in December," Sopko said.

U.S. forces assisted by Afghan Security Forces tell a poppy farmer near Combat Outpost Sabari in eastern Afghanistan's Khost province that he must destroy his crop in April 2012. Some Russian officials say that neither the Afghan government nor the departing international forces are doing enough to combat the flow of illegal drugs from Afghanistan. They fear the problem may only grow after the NATO mission ends.

Sopko said his team plans to conduct a comprehensive audit to assess how U.S. taxpayer money has been spent on programs to counter narcotics trafficking and whether it's been effective. On his recent visits, he said, he spoke with Afghan officials about whether the country will become a successful modern state or an insurgent state. "There is a third possibility," he said. "A narco-criminal state." In the hearing, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Republican, noted that in 2009, the U.S., along with other donor nations, pledged to provide 50 percent of developmental aid straight into the coffers of Afghan ministries. But that year, various oversight reports determined that some ministries were ill-equipped to receive the U.S. taxpayer-funded assistance because of a lack of adequate management or oversight. Still, "USAID apparently continued anyway, without regard to these warnings," she said.

Kathleen Campbell, USAID's acting deputy assistant on Afghanistan and Pakistan affairs, said the agency's investment in Afghanistan has reaped results and those gains need to be protected. "USAID's investment — only 3 percent of the overall cost of the war — and robust oversight have contributed to Afghanistan experiencing greater improvement in human development, a measure of health, education and standard of living than any other country in the world since 2000," she said. "We believe that assistance to Afghanistan must decrease to more sustainable levels but maintain a rate that allows Afghans to preserve the gains achieved."

Surging Afghan poppy crop threatening reconstruction - Middle East - Stripes

 

[shart_attack]

Need to find ways to start growing them thangs in the US of A, and bring them jobs home.

The Rocky Mountains have the perfect climate to grow them in the spring to late summer.

 

[sameech]

Afghan poppy crops down 40% since '08 as key towns secured

I blame global warming.

 

[waltky]

U.S. campaign destroys $80m of Taliban drug money...

U.S. campaign destroys $80m of Taliban drug money in Afghanistan
Dec. 12, 2017 - -- American military officials said a U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan destroyed $80 million in narcotics money as part of a campaign to target Taliban revenue streams.

Air Force Brig. Gen. Lance Bunch, chief of the Resolute Support Mission's future operations division, said the campaign has eliminated 25 illegal drug-processing laboratories in Helmand province, denying $16 million of the $80 million in destroyed funds that was set to be "direct revenue" to the drug lords' Taliban partners. Bunch said President Donald Trump's new South Asia strategy, which granted the U.S.-led coalition new permissions to target the Taliban's command-and-control nodes, illicit revenue-generating ventures, and logistical networks.

A U.S.-led coalition in Afghanistan destroyed $80 million in narcotics money following new permissions allowing them to target the Taliban's command-and-control nodes, illicit revenue-generating ventures, and logistical networks.​

They were previously only able to conduct American airstrikes in defense of Afghan National Security Forces who were in close proximity to Taliban fighters "This new air interdiction campaign directly strengthens the Afghan defense forces and their continued battlefield successes," he said. Bunch added the Taliban receives about $300 million to $400 million a year with about $200 million of it coming from the production of heroin and two raids of Taliban narcotics bazaars resulted in more than 2 tons of heroin and more than 5.5 tons of opium being seized.

He promised a "long winter" for the Taliban "as we will continue to disrupt their revenue sources again and again and again." "They have been completely unable to achieve any objectives from their declared Operation Mansouri during this fighting season," Bunch said. "In addition to their unrealistic goals, they have been unable to take a provincial capital or even a single city. This year the Taliban and have fared poorly."

U.S. campaign destroys $80m of Taliban drug money in Afghanistan