People and ecosystems in Colombia: casualties of the drug war.

• Author: Peterson, Sarah

Opposition to the "war on drugs" comes from numerous disparate camps, from libertarian scholars to moderate public-health officials to liberal activists for social justice. Concerns expressed by those seeking to change the way this "war" is waged are various and include criticisms of the inadequate resources devoted to treating drug addicts, the erosion of civil liberties at the hands of an increasingly powerful narcoenforcement complex, the disproportionate effect of drug-law enforcement on certain ethnic groups and economic classes, and the monumental wastefulness of a criminal justice system consumed with punishing nonviolent drug offenders. In this article, I discuss yet another reason to reevaluate the contemporary U.S. antidrug strategy: it directly threatens the health of people and ecosystems outside U.S. borders. My objective here is specifically to illustrate some of the negative effects that contemporary U.S. antidrug policy has on people and the environment in the Andean/Amazonian region of northwest South America. I begin with a brief look at the extent of coca production in the region, then consider some of the concerns that advocates of environmental protection and social justice have voiced with regard to antidrug efforts in this region. I then examine some social and environmental consequences of aerial chemical-herbicide spraying in Colombia, a primary component of a $1.3 billion congressional aid package intended to support Bogota's antidrug Plan Colombia.

Background: Coca Production

A perennial shrub of the genus Erythroxylum, the coca plant thrives in poor, acidic soils that can support few other commercially cultivated crops. Most cultivated coca comprises only two species, Erythroxylum coca and E. novogranatese, although other related species exist in the wild and are cultivated sparsely for local use (Plowman 1986, 9). According to Patrick Clawson and Rensselaer Lee, "[coca] is currently grown almost exclusively in the Andean countries of Peru, Bolivia and Colombia ... [but] can grow almost anywhere in tropical South America and in tropical regions of the world generally" (1996, 131). A coca bush begins to produce harvestable leaves within a year to a year and half of planting; its leaves can be harvested two to four times a year; and each plant can remain productive for up to twenty-five years (Clawson and Lee 1996, 132; Gardner 2001).

Although recent alternative-development programs have met with some success in reducing the production of coca in Bolivia and Peru, these reductions have been offset by skyrocketing production in Colombia (Clawson and Lee 1996, 18, 160; U.S. Office of National Drug Control Policy [ONDCP] 2001, 97). In fact, the area of land planted with coca in Colombia increased from approximately 41,000 hectares in 1992 to nearly 123,000 hectares in 1999 (Vargas 2000). The currently planted area is approximately 120,000 hectares (Will 2001).

Though the vast majority of coca goes to processors to be converted to coca paste and eventually to cocaine, some is marketed and used legally for medical and cultural purposes. (1) Legal consumption occurs primarily at the level of household use, as tea or various medical remedies. A far smaller amount goes to overseas pharmaceutical or other commercial interests, such as Coca-Cola, which derives some of its beverages' "natural flavors" from coca leaves that have been stripped of their psychotropic chemicals (Clawson and Lee 1996, 136).

Regional Environmental and Social Concerns

The Andean/Amazonian region where most of the world's coca is grown, the main area targeted by drug eradication campaigns, is the subject of concern among environmental and social activists alike. This region contains diverse ecosystems (ranging from the Andean altiplano to the Amazon rain forest), innumerable species, and threatened indigenous peoples, so the preservation of its environmental integrity has tremendous instrumental and intrinsic value. Biological and chemical eradication programs threaten the region by degrading the environment, exposing people to toxic compounds, and involving local residents--whether active in the drug trade or not-in the war on drugs.

Conservation of the natural environment of the Andean/Amazonian countries is of paramount importance to environmentalists because of that environment's vast biodiversity. Biological diversity, or biodiversity, is recognized by the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (UNCBD) to mean "the variability among living organisms from all sources including, inter alia, terrestrial, marine and other aquatic ecosystems and the ecological complexes of which they are part; this includes diversity within species, between species and of ecosystems" (United Nations 1992, Article 2: Use of Terms). Colombia and its neighboring countries of the Amazonian/Andean region are extremely biodiverse. By some estimates, 10 percent of the world's terrestrial plant and animal species exist only in Colombia (Amazon Alliance and Washington Office on Latin America 2000). Luis Naranjo, director of international programs for the American Bird Conservatory, notes that "Colombia is recognized worldwide for having more species of wild birds than any other country ... and seventy-five percent of[them] are considered ... threatened" (Naranjo 2000). This biodiversity has both intrinsic and instrumental value for Western environmentalists and local indigenous peoples.

The value of biodiversity is immense. The UNCBD recognizes this value in the opening clause of its preamble: the members of the treaty are "Conscious of the intrinsic value of biological diversity and of the ecological, genetic, social, economic, scientific, educational, cultural, recreational and aesthetic values of biological diversity and its components, [c]onscious also of the importance of biological diversity for evolution and for maintaining life sustaining systems of the biosphere, [and] that the conservation of biological diversity is a common concern of humankind' (1992).

As for the instrumental value of biodiversity, ecosystems provide humans with such goods and services as

food, fuel and fibre ... shelter and building materials, purification of air and water, detoxification and decomposition of wastes, stabilization and moderation of the Earth's climates ... generation and renewal of soil fertility ... pollination of plants, including many crops, [and] control of pests and diseases.... Our personal health, and the health of our economy and human society, depends [sic]on the continuous supply of various ecological services that would be extremely costly or impossible to replace. (United Nations Environment Program 2000) When biodiversity is threatened, as it is by some antidrug projects, the stability of ecosystems and their ability to continue to provide human societies with these vital goods and services are also threatened. This threat has implications for human populations far beyond the immediate ecologically imperiled region. In a global society, neither environmental nor economic isolation is possible. Natural resources are distributed widely from their points of origin, so changes in their availability have worldwide effects.

Biodiversity also has intrinsic value for people. Most cultures and societies identify closely in some way with the natural environment in which they exist. We adopt images and ideas from nature as symbols; we attribute human or supernatural powers to elements or places in nature; we worship nature as our spiritual creator or as that creator's creation. The importance of biodiversity to indigenous peoples is specifically highlighted by the UNCBD, which "recogniz[es] the close and traditional dependence of many indigenous and local communities embodying traditional lifestyles on biological resources" (1992, preamble). The preservation of biodiversity has particular importance for advocates of the rights of indigenous communities.

Environmental protection, then, is closely related to another important priority for social activists concerned with the Andean/Amazonian region: the preservation of local and indigenous cultures. Hundreds of distinct indigenous groups inhabit the region; specifically, fifty-eight tribes inhabit the area targeted by Plan Colombia's renewed glyphosate-spraying campaign (Amazon Alliance and Washington Office on Latin America 2000). Indiscriminate coca eradication is culturally destructive for a number of reasons. Indigenous societies have used coca for nutritional, medicinal, and spiritual purposes for centuries (Pacini and Franquemont 1986). It contains an abundance of certain vitamins and minerals, including calcium, and its mastication provides an important supplement to many local diets, which may be deficient of vital nutrients (Constantino 2000). Chewing the coca...