Opium cultivation up in northern Myanmar, addiction problem grows

Bangkok, Thailand - Opium cultivation has increased as much as fivefold in some parts of Myanmar's northern Shan State the past three years, and addiction is a growing problem in local communities, a non-governmental organization said Tuesday. Where Myanmar's ruling military government is in control, local authorities, army and pro-government militia are profiting by taxing opium farmers, the Palaung Women's Organization (PWO) said.

Official "anti-drug teams" are extorting large sums from local farmers and leaving the crop intact instead of eradicating poppy fields, the group said Tuesday on releasing their report "Poison Hills: Surging Opium Cultivation under Government Control in Burma."

When the Palaung State Liberation Army (PSLA) controlled the region, they outlawed poppy cultivation. But cultivation and addiction started increasing after the PSLA signed a ceasefire with the government in 1992, and grew worse after their surrender in 2005.

Government forces with the help of local militia have since taken control and file false poppy eradication data with police, the report said.

"Today more of the regime's troops and militias are everywhere. For us this has meant more drugs and more addiction" said Lway Nway Hnoung, principal researcher of the report.

Global demand for opium, which heroin is made from, has driven farmers to supply the product for decades, if not centuries. But the local Palaung drug problem is relatively new, said Lway Aye Nang with PWO, which was established in 2000 to empower and advance the social status of Palaung women.

"In 1992 (before the ceasefire) there was one drug user in my village. Now, in that village of a bit more than 1,000 people, there are 66 drug users," she said, adding the story is similar across most of her area in northern Shan state.

There are a bit more than 1 million Palaung in Shan State, which borders China, Thailand and Laos and has a total population of about 6 million, she said.

Locals must pay a tax to support the local militia and government forces in the area, and have increasingly turned to poppies as the best-paying crop to do it with, the report said.

The price of tea, which is the area's traditional cash crop, is controlled by the government and has fallen in recent years, while the price of opium has increased, Lway Aye Nang said.

The PWO said the increase in opium cultivation was greater than the UN Office on Drugs and Crime said in a report late last year.

After years of crop-substitution and development projects that reduced the acreage under cultivation in the region, including Myanmar, Laos and Thailand, the UN office acknowledged in December a "worrisome" trend towards increased cultivated in the illicit crop since 2006.

The PWO said resolving the issue depends on ending Myanmar's civil war and political reform in the country controlled by a military dictatorship.

"As long as this regime remains in power, drugs will continue to poison people in Burma and the region," Lway Nway Hnoung said.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/305843,opium-cultivation-up-in-northern-myanmar-addiction-problem-grows.html.