Task

Read the article and write the T (true) or F (false) for each statement. 1. Afghanistan's opium crop cultivation is expected to rise in eight provinces. 2. Big part of Afghanistan's opium is cultivated in province Helmand. 3. Afghanistan farmers is subsidised to grow other crops instead of opium. 4. Drug lords have moved their opium plantations to the south of Helmand. 5. Mr Lemahieu says that the security and quality of life of Afghan farmers should be increased.

Everywhere coming up poppies

Afghanistan's opium crop
THE United Nations has published this years forecast for the Afghan opium crop and the news is not good. The annual poppy harvest begins soon, and despite all the efforts to reduce cultivation, it looks likely to rise yet again. The harvest in nine of the growing provinces will probably increase and it is expected to remain steady in about in another eight. In only one of Afghanistans provinces does it looks set to fall, according to the forecast. Cultivation is still lower than when it was at its peak, in 2007, but the nationwide trend now looks to be moving in the wrong direction. This years bumper crop means that Afghanistans heroin will continue to feed an exploding population of addicts within the countrys own borders as well as in neighbouring Russia and Iran. Taliban coffers will swell with the proceeds and everywhere the drug money will poison attempts to build an Afghan state. Helmand, which alone grew nearly half of Afghanistans opium in 2011 and is the focus of the most intensive counter-narcotics push, is one of those provinces where production is unlikely to change. Sky-high opium prices are being blamed for the recent backsliding. Other factors, including such familiar conditions as poverty, insecurity, corruption and government complicity, all continue to play their bleak roles. In Helmand they conspired to undermine what progress was made by the British governments food zone initiative. Under that plan farmers are subsidised to grow alternative cropswhile the energetic provincial governor threatens to tear up their poppy if they dont. The food zone covers areas of central Helmand where security conditions have improved with an influx of British, American and other foreign troops. The initiative has enjoyed some success cutting cultivation in the areas where it is implemented. So the drug lords who have seen their trade threatened in the food zone have upped sticks to the north of the province, or to neighbouring Farah. In relatively insecure areas, beyond the reach of Helmands governor and his international allies, they have struck deals with the Taliban, dug new wells and carried on. The most powerful drug-trading families have significant political clout. The gains we are making in the heartland might be undone in the north, laments Jean-Luc Lemahieu, director of the UNs Office on Drugs and Crime in Afghanistan. Its an excellent illustration of the collusion between the powerful in Lashkar Gah [Helmands capital] and the Taliban who control that area. Afghan counter-narcotics officials fear that as foreign troops withdraw more and more areas will be similarly put out of reach of their programmes. The UNs latest report (and other gloomy prognoses) will encourage observers who advocate buying up the lot in order to implement a licensing system to feed the demand for medical painkillers. Defenders of the existing programme think that would only encourage more farmers to grow more opium, turning the country into a vast narco-welfare state. Where the drug trade is so lucrative, they argue, the most entrenched traffickers could easily match any legalised price. Mr Lemahieu believes there are no quick fixes. As he sees it the war on opium in Afghanistan has decades left to run and might well get worse before it gets any better. Increasing the security and quality of life of Afghan farmers is the key. This is the cure of the disease, he says. His is hardly a prescription for fatalism however. Strong medication is required at this stage too. Its brand name is political will.