cannabisnews.com: No Crops Spared in Colombia's Coca War





No Crops Spared in Colombia's Coca War
Posted by FoM on January 30, 2001 at 22:23:10 PT
By Juan Forero
Source: New York Times
With considerable training and financing from the United States, the Colombian Army has begun an aggressive land and air assault on the country's coca-growing heartland, claiming to have killed a quarter of all coca crops there in the last six weeks.Low-flying aerial spray planes — protected from groundfire by two elite battalions that are dropped into coca fields — have blanketed four regions of Caquetá and Putumayo Provinces, spraying herbicide over 65,785 acres as of Sunday, according to newly released military estimates. 
The two provinces are believed to produce three-quarters of Colombia's coca, the leaves of which are used to make cocaine.Although aerial defoliation of coca has been used across Colombia for 10 years, government officials here say this is the first serious effort in this isolated region. The effort is a centerpiece of President Andrés Pastrana's Plan Colombia, a multibillion-dollar effort to cut Colombia's coca crop in half by 2005 and, with it, a crucial revenue source for leftist guerrillas who are active in the area. To reduce the supply of drugs, the United States has pledged $1.1 billion toward that plan, mostly in the form of transport helicopters and training for antinarcotics troops. Their role is to protect spray planes and destroy coca-processing laboratories in the jungle.The aerial eradication has not come without a price. Farmers in the Valley of Guamuez in northwestern Putumayo, a swath containing the largest concentration of coca, have complained that legal crops like plantains and yucca were destroyed along with coca. The farmers are typically poor, and some, caught in a violent world between rebels and paramilitaries, turned to coca to eke out a better subsistence. "I have the proof to show that it wasn't just the coca farmers who have suffered," said Carlos Alberto Palacios, secretary of human development in the town of La Hormiga."We believe people will go hungry," said Mr. Palacios, an expert on the coca trade. "They've fumigated everything, fields and plantain rows and yucca and everything that people need to live on." Farmers have also complained of vomiting, rashes and other side effects.On a half-hour helicopter flight with Gen. Mario Montoya over what was once Colombia's most bountiful coca-producing region, fields that once were bright green with coca and other plants were a pale brown, wiped free of vegetation for miles around. The tin roofs of farmers' huts stood out, shining in the sun in a sea of drab brown. Military figures show that 45,551 acres of coca had been eradicated in that area — a triangle comprising the towns of La Hormiga, San Miguel and the western edge of Puerto Asís — as of Sunday."This is the only way," the general said, taking a look through the window of the copter. "We don't have another way."General Montoya, who is in charge of the effort, said as much as 250,000 acres in the two provinces was dedicated to coca before spraying began Dec. 19, a figure far higher than an estimate last January of 185,000.United States officials, who provide the Colombian authorities with satellite maps that help pinpoint coca fields, confirmed General Montoya's assessments. American officials also said the spraying — using glyphosate, a powerful chemical found in many pesticides — is at least 90 percent effective in first- time use, wiping out fields within a few weeks. General Montoya said that once a field has been sprayed, it takes three months before farmers can replant.Mr. Palacios, the coca trade expert, and other town officials said farmers did cultivate coca, but also a host of legal crops, as well as cattle and other livestock. The defoliation, Mr. Palacios said, has prompted many farmers and their families to abandon their homes.The health department of Putumayo is in the process of collecting testimony from farmers whose lands were sprayed, said Nancy Sánchez, who is supervising the effort as coordinator of the department's human rights section. The affidavits will be presented to doctors studying the effects of the defoliation, as well as the Colombian government."There's complaints about intoxication, diarrhea, vomiting, skin rashes, red eyes, headaches," Ms. Sánchez said. "In the children, above all, there are ill effects on their skin."American officials dispute such reports, insisting that numerous tests on glyphosate have demonstrated that the pesticide cannot cause harm to humans or animals. Nonetheless, directions on the application of glyphosate products in the United States warn users not to use "this product in a way that will contact workers or other persons, either directly or through drift."The Colombian government, which is concerned about how aerial spraying will be viewed overseas by potential financial backers, points out that the farmers whose fields were sprayed had ample opportunity to sign pacts that would have prevented aerial eradication. Under a program that already has 2,000 signatories across Putumayo, the farmers in the Valley of Guamuez could have agreed to yank their coca plants in return for up to $1,000 worth of livestock and food per family. Although many farmers across Putumayo remain suspicious about the government's promises, the government has pledged to those who sign that markets for legal crops are being developed."The people from this zone had not shown up," said President Pastrana's point man on Putumayo, referring to the farmers in the Valley of Guamuez. The official, Gonzalo de Francisco, added, "These people can't be angry with the fumigation; they were doing something outside legal norms."Mr. de Francisco has also noted that destroying coca farms prevents the use of millions of gallons of pesticides and precursor chemicals needed to produce cocaine annually. Eduardo Gamarra, an expert on the coca trade at Florida International University in Miami, said the damage from coca farming and the processing of coca leaves has "some very serious environmental implications."Mr. de Francisco said that complaints from farmers whose fields were sprayed have been filed with the government's internal affairs office, which investigates allegations of official wrongdoing. Those whose farms were unnecessarily sprayed can receive compensation, Mr. de Francisco said, noting that the farmers remain free to sign accords and join the government's self-eradication program.General Montoya, who commands army brigades throughout the southern region, where most of Colombia's coca grows, acknowledged that "errors can present themselves" and that some legal crops were defoliated. "We know that we can make mistakes," General Montoya said, "but the mistakes are minimal compared to the magnitude of the operation that we're undertaking."The general explained that defoliating some legal crops is hard to avoid because coca farmers tend to hide their crops by planting next to larger, legal crops, like banana trees. "When we've gone to examine the countryside, we've found that there's plantain bananas, we've found that there is yucca, but we've also found there is coca," General Montoya said.The anti-coca effort has been fast, General Montoya said, but not easy. Because of the presence of rebels from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, the army must fly in soldiers from two American-trained battalions before spraying herbicide from OVZ-10 and T-65 planes. The soldiers later shower to cleanse themselves of any of the herbicide, the military says. "The people here are always in the middle," said Ms. Sánchez, the health department worker. "The guerrillas come and they threaten, they make them pay taxes. Then the paramilitaries come and they get assassinated and threatened, and now the government comes in and fumigates them." Source: New York Times (NY)Author: Juan ForeroPublished: January 31, 2001Copyright: 2001 The New York Times Company Address: 229 West 43rd Street, New York, NY 10036 Fax: (212) 556-3622 Contact: letters nytimes.com Website: http://www.nytimes.com/ Forum: http://forums.nytimes.com/comment/ Related Article:Troops Launch Blitz on Colombian Cocahttp://cannabisnews.com/news/thread8430.shtmlCannabisNews Articles - Colombiahttp://cannabisnews.com/thcgi/search.pl?K=colombia
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Comment #3 posted by Mom on February 01, 2001 at 06:53:52 PT
For the Children
For the WHITE children. Poison the non-white children.
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Comment #2 posted by Dan B on January 31, 2001 at 15:27:55 PT:
Correction
In the first comment, I stated that "25% of 250,000 is 187,500." In actuality, that is 75% of 250,000 (I misstated my arithmetic), which is (quite obviously) 250,000 minus 25%.At any rate, I think the rest of it holds up to scrutiny.Dan B
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Comment #1 posted by Dan B on January 31, 2001 at 15:13:58 PT:
A Lesson in Arithmetic
". . . the Colombian Army has begun an aggressive land and air assault on the country's coca-growing heartland, claiming to have killed a quarter of all coca crops there in the last six weeks. . . spraying herbicide over 65,785 acres as of Sunday, according to newly released military estimates""General Montoya, who is in charge of the effort, said as much as 250,000 acres in the two provinces was dedicated to coca before spraying began Dec. 19, a figure far higher than an estimate last January of 185,000."Okay, now that we have the figures, let's do some math. They estimated last January that 185,000 acres were used for the purpose of growing coca. Their current estimates (pre-spraying) are 250,000, and they claim to have eliminated 25% of that amount.25% of 250,000 is 187,500, which means that they have about 2500 more acres to go before they reach the level of last year's total crop. Of course, if we use the estimate of 250,000 acres and simply subtract their estimated total acres of sprayed coca (65,785), we get 184,215. Not much of an "improvement." And consider that they are destroying other crops as well. The actual acreage of sprayed coca is more than likely far less than their total estimates.Meanwhile, "There's complaints about intoxication, diarrhea, vomiting, skin rashes, red eyes, headache . . . In the children, above all, there are ill effects on their skin." In addition, factor in the environmental cost (how long before people can grow food crops on that land again? How many additional acres of rainforest will be destroyed by coca farmers next year to make up for the now contaminated land?), as well as the cost of the spraying and the military cover provided in order to carry out that spraying.Consider, too, the continued carnage on the part of right-wing paramilitaries who are torturing and murdering people at a rate of several dozen a week, all because of this "humanitarian" policy called the "war on drugs." I might add that these paramilitary groups are at-best-indirectly supported by your and my American tax dollars.Now, consider that even after they have destroyed 1/4 of the entire crop, exactly as much coca as last year is still growing! Does any of this sound sane to anyone? Only to those who are making money by selling glysophate (the chemical being sprayed, brought to you by the Monsanto Corporation) and military helicopters, war-hungry military types, and greedy politicans. And yet, the carnage continues. And all we can do is say I told you so and keep trying to end it all.Dan B
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