Pubdate: Tue, 31 Jul 2007
Source: Independent  (UK)
Copyright: 2007 Independent Newspapers (UK) Ltd.
Contact:  http://www.independent.co.uk/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/209
Author: Thomas Sutcliffe
Cited: http://www.senliscouncil.org/modules/Opium_licensing
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/Afghanistan
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/Senlis (Senlis Council)

THE BITTER HARVEST OF AN ILLOGICAL POLICY

For those of you who like brainteasers, here is a conundrum. Last 
Tuesday in the Lords, the freshly ennobled Lord Malloch Brown, 
Minister of State at the FCO with responsibility for Africa, Asia and 
the United Nations, was coming clean about the failure to eradicate 
opium production in Afghanistan. He said: "It is a terrible black 
mark on the international community's performance in Afghanistan ... 
that so far we have not prevailed in the efforts to defeat the growth 
of this pernicious crop."

It wasn't all bad news; in areas where the "writ of the Afghan 
Government runs" the size of the crop was coming down - assisted by 
crop substitution and development support. Unfortunately, in the much 
larger areas, where the writ of the Afghan government doesn't run, 
the crop has increased significantly. And the puzzle I would set you 
is this: how would you explain to an Afghan farmer who has just seen 
his livelihood destroyed that in several rural provinces of England - 
all areas where the writ of the British Government still runs - the 
cultivation of opium poppies has recently increased markedly, with 
the explicit approval of the authorities?

It's true that the farmers of Northamptonshire and Lincolnshire who 
have recently turned fields over to the cultivation of opium poppies 
aren't selling their crop to drug dealers, or at least not to 
outlawed ones. They're growing the poppies for the pharmaceutical 
company Macfarlan Smith, which makes medical opiates and is eager for 
new sources of raw material because of a worldwide shortage of 
morphine and similar drugs.

So, if you've solved the first half of the puzzle, here comes the 
second. How do you explain to the Afghan farmer that he can't have a 
licence to fill that commodity gap, while his infinitely more 
prosperous western counterpart can? Is it because his way of life is 
inherently criminal, as the eradication programme seems to imply, or 
because other interests are served by the arbitrary destruction of 
his poppy fields?

There are certainly those who would be dismayed if the failing Afghan 
eradication programme was abandoned. The corrupt elements of the 
Karzai government and regional administrations, who make a healthy 
living out of turning a blind eye, would probably regret a move to 
legalised trade. DynCorp, the US military contractor which supplies 
enforcing muscle for eradication sweeps, probably wouldn't either.

Above all, the Taliban would be utterly dismayed. For them, the 
policy of poppy-field destruction is a heady double hit. They can 
extort heavy "taxes" on farmers and then reap the propaganda benefits 
of destructive raids on poppy farms. Indeed, were you to ask a 
Taliban strategist to come up with a policy best suited to sustain an 
insurgency, it's doubtful that they could do any better.

As the Senlis Council, a development think-tank, has reported, the US 
has successfully pursued a legalisation policy before, when it became 
clear that the Nixon administration's attempts to stamp out Turkish 
opium farming was politically and socially impossible. Instead, they 
tried licensing and a preferential trade agreement, which poved 
highly effective. Perhaps Gordon Brown could suggest that George Bush 
might emulate the Taliban and Richard Nixon, and put practical 
results ahead of ideological purity. It's not the plant that's 
pernicious, it's the policy. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake