U.S.: Coca Cultivation Up Despite Six Years of Plan Colombia
November 7, 2008 by editor
Filed under Drug Trade, Latin America, Politics, United States
Global Geopolitics Net Sites / IPS
Jim Lobe
WASHINGTON, Nov 6 (IPS) – Despite the expenditure of nearly five billion dollars in U.S. military, security, and economic assistance, the cultivation of coca leaf and production of cocaine in Colombia actually increased between 2000 and 2007, according to a major review by the U.S. Congress’s independent investigative agency.
In a report released this week by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), investigators found that ”Plan Colombia” — the comprehensive anti-drug scheme initiated under the administration of former President Bill Clinton in 1999 — has largely failed to achieve its goal of reducing illegal drug production in the Andean nation by at least half by 2007.
While the Plan appears to have reached that goal for opium poppy cultivation and heroin production, the far greater cultivation of coca increased by about 15 percent and cocaine production by about four percent over the six years, according to the report.
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