Taliban – At least they were destroying Opium Production
Who are the Taliban? I’m not too sure. They don’t look like nice guys at all. Of course all my data comes from media controlled outlets from the U.S. mainly. But from all sources I can see they look pretty darn strict on the population.
But one thing I definitely see, and which is unarguable is the fact that the Taliban were extinguishing opium production in Afghanistan. And thus cutting deeply into the world heroin addiction problem.
Afghanistan is currently the greatest opium producer in the world – and by far! Approximately 7,700 metric tons of opium production occurs in Afghanistan as compared to the #2 producer (Myanmar) at about 400 metric tons! And poor ol’ Russia is getting the bulk of it with 91% of this production entering Russia through opium trade routes. Not to make light of it but Russia’s heroin problem makes ours look like a sugar high so to speak.
Well, the Taliban were solving this problem somehow. The Taliban banned opium production in Afghanistan in 2000. It again re-issued this ban on July 27, 2000. By February 2001 opium production had been reduced from 12,600 acres to only 17 acres.
September 11th happened, along comes a US lead force targeting terrorists, the Taliban were booted, new government was put into force under US control and direction.
Opium production since that time has increased from around 100 metric tons to an eye-popping 7,700 metric tons! That’s a lot of heroin and a huge need for heroin detox.
Based on the 2009 World Drug Report from the United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime more land is now used for opium production in Afghanistan alone than the entirety of all of Latin America’s coca production. Wow! Forget Scarface! Who is this Poppy guy?!
I definitely don’t know the whole picture here. I don’t know who the puppet masters are. I don’t know what the true reasons behind all this stuff is.
But I do know at least that the Taliban were shrinking a lot of wallets. And that probably upset a few people.
Tags: Heroin addiction, Opiate Detox
