Afghan poppy crop hit by mysterious disease

[nabraxas]

Friday, May 14, 2010

SHANE MCLEOD: It's by far Afghanistan's biggest cash crop and it's under threat from a mysterious disease. Opium poppies grown in Afghanistan produces more than 90 per cent of the world's illicit supply of heroin.

The Taliban uses the profits to finance its operations. Poppy eradication is a key part of NATO's strategy to defeat the insurgents.

But the effects of the unknown fungal disease are also beginning to affect legal crops and locals suspect NATO is behind the outbreak.

Michael Edwards has this report.

MICHAEL EDWARDS: The heroin that an opium poppy produces might be the scourge of law enforcement agencies in western countries but for farmers in southern Afghanistan the plant represents a vital source of income.

Afghanistan produces 92 per cent of the world's opium but in recent months crop yields have been falling. Farmers says their crops have been hit by a mysterious disease.

FARMER 1 (translated): I don't understand what's happened. It was perfectly okay before but we can see the poppies aren't right when we scratch them to extract the liquid. Before we could cultivate our crops easily. The whole process only took two months.

MICHAEL EDWARDS: Experts says the disease appears to be a fungus which attacks the root of the plant, climbs up the stem and makes the opium capsule wither away. Legal crops and livestock are also being affected.

FARMER 2 (translated): They've sprayed some kind of chemical. They've put it in the water that supplies our crops. People are saying that they've sprayed chemicals but we don't know what they are. I think it's affecting our cattle. They've stopped eating and they're not giving milk. And it's affected our berries and apricots and when we eat them we get sick.

FARMER 3 (translated): I have an apricot farm and it's been affected really badly and I haven't had a good harvest this time.

MICHAEL EDWARDS: The international community has put a massive effort into reducing Afghanistan's opium poppy production.

The drug provides an income for thousands of poor farmers who are reluctant to switch to legal crops because they are less profitable.

It also provides a large revenue source for the Taliban. Antonio Maria Costa is the head of the United Nation Office on Drugs and Crime.

ANTONIO MARIA COSTA: We believe that about half of the opium crops in southern Afghanistan are affected and about half of the total output in these regions will be destroyed which means all together about a quarter of the opium production of last year would be removed from the market because of this infestation.

MICHAEL EDWARDS: Antonio Maria Costa says diseases affecting the opium poppy crop are quite common. But he says he what sets this apart is its severity.

ANTONIO MARIA COSTA: Opium plants have been affected in Afghanistan. What is new this year is the severity of the problem in the region which is at the heart of the opium cultivation and of course at the heart of the insurgency.

So it has important political dimension as well as it has important economic dimension for the farmers.

MICHAEL EDWARDS: And Antonio Maria Costa says this political dimension could mean increased support for the Taliban in key areas of southern Afghanistan such as the Helmand Province.

ANTONIO MARIA COSTA: Certainly farmers that will lose their opium crop and therefore their main source of income will be destabilised in terms of their own social situation and may then be tempted no doubt to ask to be part of the problem of insurgency in Afghanistan.

Then there is a question of the opium economy. The price of opium has already increased in the southern part of the country by over 50 per cent from about $60 a kilo to about $90, $100 a kilo.

And third all of these opium price changes will have an impact on the stocks of opium. We have estimated that over the past five years about 10,000 tonnes of unsold opium have been accumulated with a very powerful re-evaluation of these stocks this will have an impact on the funding of insurgency, the funding of terrorists as well as the funding of general organised crime that have been trafficking opium out of Afghanistan.

MICHAEL EDWARDS: NATO has denied it has anything to do with the outbreak.

http://www.abc.net.au/worldtoday/content/2010/s2899489.htm

[Baba ghanoush]

This is ridiculous. JUST LEAVE THEM ALONE!!!!!!!! They make out that the Opium which is being produced is a vital reason as to why insurgents are continuing on with their endeavors. Maybe it also has something to do with you bastards attacking innocent civilians????

I don't know what is going on over there as all I know is what the news tells me and we all know that's all bullshit. So in reality we (people outside their region) have no idea what is REALLY going on. So why don't we call a truce, actually listen to what they want (probably just a hug) and then distribute poppies for all

I am showing my lack of knowledge on the situation in just 4 sentences but i just can not see how people do this to each other

[paradox]

holy fuck man, that's fucking serious oldschool 50's reefermadness style stupidity. sounds like the dumbest thing since cane toads or something. though when it comes to stupid mistakes that list is long..

[bℓσωηG]

incase yo missed it in the youtube section...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ID1UbonhryE&feature=player_embedded

[faustus]

supply and demand... wouldn't this just raise opium prices?

[nabraxas]

wouldn't this just raise opium prices?

from the article:

Then there is a question of the opium economy. The price of opium has already increased in the southern part of the country by over 50 per cent from about $60 a kilo to about $90, $100 a kilo.

obviously just the suspicion ov UN involvement is likely to drive impoverished farmers into the arms ov the Taliban & a drop in production was always going to increase the value ov the 10,000 tonnes the Taliban has stockpiled...one would hope that the brains planning things in Afghanistan were cleverer than that...having said that it certainly seems suspicious.

[bℓσωηG]

 

[apothecary]

supply and demand... wouldn't this just raise opium prices?

 

According to the UN there are supposed to be stockpiles which can supply roughly ten years worth of demand at current global levels.

Suspicions might be well founded. Anyone remember this?

In addition, the U.S. has also been involved in the development of the fungus Fusarium oxysporum to wipe out coca.[1][2] In 2000, the Congress of the United States approved use of Fusarium as a biological control agent to kill coca crops in Colombia (and another fungus to kill opium poppies in Afghanistan), but these plans were canceled by then-President Clinton, who was concerned that the unilateral use of a biological agent would be perceived by the rest of the world as biological warfare. The Andean nations have since banned its use throughout the region. (The use of biological agents to kill crops may be illegal under the Biological Weapons Convention of 1975.)

From:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coca_eradication

Sounds all too familiar

In 1998, Supporters in the US Congress tried to attach the use of the fungus to a 1.8 billion dollar aid package, but in 2000, the plan was rejected by the Colombia government and the United Nations. "The [Colombian] government consulted national experts on the subject and decided not to agree to test the fungus because it felt that any agent foreign to the country's native ecosystem could pose a serious risk to the environment and to human health." Colombia's neighbors, Peru and Ecuador, have also expressed concern about the proposed use of the fungus causing them ecological and agricultural damage. (http://www.greens.org/s-r/26/26-14.html)

 

#

"Solomon et al. (2005) conducted a study on the effects on human health and the environment of aerial spraying of glyphosate herbicide for the illicit crops eradication programme in Colombia, based on a review of literature. It was found the formulation of glyphosate used could produce temporary irritation in eyes and skin, but no effects on reproduction were observed. No ecological field data were collected from the region, but a review found that glyphosate had low toxicity to non-target organisms other than plants. The formulation used in the eradication programme in Colombia is of low toxicity for mammals and vertebrates, although some temporary impacts may occur. Amphibians are the group most sensitive to this formulation, and it has been suggested that other formulations be tested when eradication is conducted near to water bodies, in order to minimise impacts on amphibian populations (Solomon et al., 2005). Relyea (2005) tested the impacts of glyphosate on amphibians and concluded that it could cause high rates of mortality in larval stages and lead to population decline.

"There appear to have been no systematic field studies on the possibility of loss of forest from unintended drift of glyphosate during aerial spraying."

Source:

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, "Coca Cultivation in the Andean Region: A Survey of Bolivia, Colombia and Peru" (Vienna, Austria: June 2006), p. 44.

http://www.unodc.org/pdf/andean/Andean_full_report.pdf

#

The US Department of Agriculture reports "A pathogenic strain of Fusarium oxysporum, causes Fusarium wilt, a disease that afflicts many crops such as watermelon, muskmelon, and basil but is a bigger problem for tomato growers."

Source:

"USDA, Canada Collaborate on Fusarium Wilt", Methyl Bromide Alternatives Newsletter (Beltsville, MD: USDA Agricultural Research Service, April 2000).

http://www.ars.usda.gov/is/np/mba/apr00/wilt.htm

#

"Guio (2003), in his study in Samaniego, Nariño (Colombia), reports that aerial fumigation of poppy crops also affect household crops and alternative crops promoted by UNODC. Intensification of fumigation has lead to an increase in complaints to the Defensoria del Pueblo regarding impacts on farmers' health, domestic animals, fishes and legal crops. Ortiz et al. (2004), in an essay about agriculture, illicit crops and the environment for the National Environmental Forum (Colombia), mentions that recent studies in Putumayo have concluded that more than 2,700 hectares of licit crops, including fruits, and more than 200,000 fish, were lost because of fumigations. These figures are for people that submitted their cases to local authorities."

Source:

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, "Coca Cultivation in the Andean Region: A Survey of Bolivia, Colombia and Peru" (Vienna, Austria: June 2006), p. 44.

http://www.unodc.org/pdf/andean/Andean_full_report.pdf

#

"Velaidez (2001) visited the Municipality of Cartagena de Chaira in the Department of Caquet between November 1998 and February 1999 to investigate the impact of aerial fumigation on farmers and their crops. This study reported unintended effects of aerial glyphosate spraying but no quantitative data, with affects on rubber and cocoa plantations and food crops such as plantain, maize, yucca, rice, vegetables and fruits. Cattle were reported to lose hair after eating pastures previously affected by the fumigation. The death of young chickens and farmed fish was reported as a result of related water contamination."

Source:

United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, "Coca Cultivation in the Andean Region: A Survey of Bolivia, Colombia and Peru" (Vienna, Austria: June 2006), p. 44.

http://www.unodc.org/pdf/andean/Andean_full_report.pdf

#

"Aerial spraying of a marijuana field near a Rarámuri village carried out by the Federal Attorney General's Office Procuraduría General de la República, PGR) left 300 sick and injured and may have killed a two-year old girl according to the Chihuahua State Human Rights Office (Comisión Estatal de Derechos Humanos, CEDH)."

Source:

Macias Medina, Silvia, "PGR Allegedly Sprays Marijuana Field, Killing Child and Injuring 300", reprinted in Frontera NorteSur, originally published in El Diaro, August 5, 2000. Available on the web at http://www.nmsu.edu/~frontera/jul_aug00/today.html, accessed May 21, 2007.

#

When aerially sprayed, the herbicide Glyphosate can drift for up to about half of a mile. In Colombia, where the herbicide Glyphosate is sprayed from airplanes, children have lost hair and suffered diarrhea as a result of its application.

Source:

Cox, C., "Glyphosate, Part 2: Human Exposure and Ecological Effects," Journal of Pesticide Reform, Vol. 15 (Eugene, OR: Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to Pesticides, 1995); Lloyd, R., "Publisher Warns about Impacts of Drug War," World Rainforest Report 37, (Lismore, NSW: Australia, 1997); Drug Enforcement Agency, Draft Supplement to the Environmental Impact Statements for Cannabis Eradication in the Contiguous United States and Hawaii (Washington DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, April 1998).

Edited May 23, 2010 by apothecary

[del]

Why not use the crops comercially? These farmers are going to grow it so why not work with them and use the opium in the pharmaceutical industry and provide them with the desired strains of poppy. Work with them not against them.

Western countries grow poppies (Aus included) commercially. We dont need to with the amout of poppies that are grown elsewhere! better off using this land for food. This seems crazy to have poppy farms in Aus considering we cant even pick a naturally growing mushroom or grow our own hemp! (we all know this, I know)

thats my uninformed opinion

del

[ThunderIdeal]

well, the government is pretty much in charge over here. over there, last i heard, the government doesn't have a lot of control beyond the capital, so if you allowed them to grow medical poppies the taliban could still come in and claim the loot for the black market to fund their activities. that's why they don't do that, i reckon.