Pubdate: Thu, 02 Aug 2007
Source: International Herald-Tribune (International)
Copyright: International Herald Tribune 2007
Contact:  http://www.iht.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/212
Author: Eduardo Porter
Note: Eduardo Porter is a member of the New York Times editorial board.

GLOBALIZATION AND THE NARCOTICS TRADE

For all its global reach, there is something antiquated about the 
drug trade. The story of a bag of cocaine peddled in an American 
suburb, for instance, often begins in the Andes, where Quechua and 
Aymara Indians have harvested coca for centuries.

Cooked in nearby labs and transported through Mexico into the United 
States by Mexican cartels, cocaine's path to market is not unlike 
that of a shirt - a straightforward chain from raw material in the 
third world to finished product in the first.

Chemistry, and globalization, are changing this dynamic, however. The 
unusual case of Zhenli Ye Gon, who was arrested in Maryland last week 
following the discovery of $205 million of alleged drug money in his 
house in Mexico City, underscores how the same process of global 
sourcing that ripped apart the integrated industries of the 20th 
century, replacing them with networks of production scattered around 
the globe, is reconfiguring the drug trade, too.

Ye Gon, who was born in Shanghai, migrated to Mexico in 1990 and 
became a Mexican citizen five years ago, is accused of illegally 
importing into Mexico tons of pseudoephedrine and other chemicals 
from China and other countries to supply methamphetamine labs run by 
Mexican drug cartels in Mexico and American border states.

The new Mexican-made drug has virtually replaced American homegrown 
meth, which used to be made by small producers that often sourced 
their pseudoephedrine at the local pharmacy. Seizures of imported 
meth along the southwest border increased from 2,706 pounds in 2003 
to 4,346 pounds in 2005. The number of methamphetamine labs seized in 
the United States plummeted from 10,212 to 5,846 over the same period.

This shift of the meth supply is changing the American market for 
illegal substances. The National Drug Intelligence Center reports 
that nearly 40 percent of state and local law enforcement officials 
nationwide say meth now represents the greatest drug threat to their areas.

Stopping large-scale traffickers who can source raw materials 
anywhere around the globe will make interdiction much more difficult 
for law enforcement. Mexico has seen a surge in illegal imports of 
pseudoephedrine from China and Germany. According to officials from 
the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency, India is another source. These 
shipments are not easy to track. Mexican officials noted that many of 
Ye Gon's pseudoephedrine shipments to Mexico passed unnoticed through 
U.S. ports with fake documents.

This pattern of global sourcing also points to big changes in the 
economics of Mexican crime. Following Ye Gon's arrest, the head of 
Colombia's national police warned that Mexico and Colombia would have 
to prepare to do battle against Chinese and Russian organized crime.

Ye Gon is the first Chinese-born to be charged of drug trafficking in 
Mexico in at least a decade, according to Mexican news media reports. 
But the irruption of Ye Gon into Mexican drug trafficking is also 
emblematic of much broader changes as Mexico adapts to China's 
emergence in the global economy.

For at least a century, successive Mexican governments have been wary 
of China. Chinese immigration to northern Mexico in the earlier part 
of the last century was often met with violence. In 1911, troops 
loyal to General Francisco Villa massacred 250 Chinese in Torreon. In 
1921, president Alvaro Obregon passed a law barring future 
immigration of Chinese workers. In 1931, thousands of Chinese were 
expelled from the country. Until recently, Mexico's economic ties to 
China were tenuous, at best. A decade ago, Mexico imported merely $1 
billion worth of Chinese products.

Yet the bilateral links have grown. Last year, Mexico imported $24.4 
billion in Chinese goods. Fears of competition from China, and its 
enormous and inexpensive labor force, have grown apace. Reports in 
recent years that some of the maquiladora plants along Mexico's 
northern border have decamped to China have sent Mexicans into 
paroxysms of economic anxiety.

The saga of Ye Gon suggests that this rivalry is now extending into 
the most insatiable consumer market in the world.

Eduardo Porter is a member of the New York Times editorial board.
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman