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Date: April 30, 2024 Tue
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Results for poppy cultivation
14 results foundAuthor: Mansfield, David Title: An Analysis of Licit Opium Poppy Cultivation: India and Turkey Summary: For most of the 20th Century, morphine and codeine have been used for the relief of pain, suppressing coughs, and treating diarrhoea. Indeed, in the last thirty years both opiates have been recommended by the World Health Organisation as essential therapeutic tools with a wide range of medical applications and, more recently, in the treatment of cancer-related pain. Consequently, over the last twenty years the demand for opiate raw materials has increased significantly. However, mirroring this increase in the demand for opiates for legitimate medical and scientific needs has been an increasing concern over the illegal use of opiates, from smoking and eating opium in the 19th Century to smoking and injecting heroin in the late part of the 20th Century. The challenge for the international community has been to establish a regulatory system that ensures that the legitimate medical and scientific needs for opiates are met, whilst preventing diversion to illicit markets. This report seeks to assess the scale and nature of any potential diversion from the licit trade through a comparative analysis of the different processes and controls applied in two source countries, India and Turkey. It compares the different regulatory and control mechanisms that are applied in each of these countries and identifies lessons learned and ‘best practice’ in the cultivation, production and regulatory mechanisms for licit opium poppy. Details: Unpublished report, 2001. 54p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed June 13, 2018 at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/266277621_AN_ANALYSIS_OF_LICIT_OPIUM_POPPY_CULTIVATION_INDIA_AND_TURKEY Year: 2001 Country: Asia URL: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/266277621_AN_ANALYSIS_OF_LICIT_OPIUM_POPPY_CULTIVATION_INDIA_AND_TURKEY Shelf Number: 116674 Keywords: Drug ControlNarcoticsOpium Poppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: Development in a Drugs Environment: A Strategic Approach to 'Alternative Development' Summary: Whichever way we look at it Alternative Development is at a crossroads: there is confusion over language and terms, concerns over the technical capacity of implementing bodies, and the growing view that the attribution of both drug control and development outcomes to alternative development projects remains opaque. The result is funding for alternative development projects continues to fall. There are certainly many in the wider development community who question how alternative development differs from conventional rural development and whether the inclusion of key cross cutting issues such as poverty, gender, the environment and conflict have actually manifested in improvements in the lives and livelihoods of primary stakeholders. Without more robust evidence of the impact of these programmes on both human development indicators and illicit drug crop cultivation, as well as improved confidence in the effectiveness of those bodies that have traditionally designed and implemented alternative development programmes, it is unlikely that levels of funding for the kind of discrete area based alternative development projects of the past will actually recover. More recently in Afghanistan, and increasingly in other source countries in Asia, the term ‘alternative development’ has been substituted with ‘Alternative Livelihoods’ with little recognition of the conceptual and operational differences. Elsewhere terms such as ‘Sustainable Alternative Livelihoods’ and indeed ‘Sustainable Livelihoods’ itself are sneaking into the rubric of drug control agencies as they search for a common language and legitimacy with the development community. Even the term ‘Alternative Development’ still means ‘many things to many people’. For those whose performance is measured simply in terms of reductions in the amount of opium poppy and coca grown, alternative development is seen as simply as the ‘carrot’ to the eradication ‘stick’, and the provision of development assistance is contingent on reductions in illicit drug crop cultivation. For others, reductions in illicit drug crop cultivation are an externality of a development process (that includes extending good governance and the rule of law) aimed at achieving sustainable improvements in lives and livelihoods. In terms of both process and the primary goal there is still much disagreement with regard to alternative development. However, there is a danger of ‘throwing the baby out with the bathwater’. Alternative development projects have achieved both development and drug control outcomes in specific geographical areas where more conventional development agencies are often not even present, despite the prevailing levels of poverty and conflict. For those who have experienced the low levels of literacy, high incidence of food insecurity, infant mortality and malnutrition that typically exist in illicit drug crop producing areas, as well as the lack of governance and prevailing levels of violence and intimidation from both state and non-state actors, arguments about the relatively high income of opium poppy and coca growing households seems rather inappropriate and ill informed. To this group the subsequent improvements in the income and quality of life of communities that often accompany alternative development projects at the same time as levels of opium poppy or coca cultivation fall are obvious, even if they might have been documented better or achieved more cost effectively. Given the concentration of illicit drug crops in marginal areas where weak governance, conflict and poverty prevail it is clear that the current impasse on the role of the development community in improving the lives and livelihoods of those residing in illicit drug crop producing areas has to be overcome so that both development and drug control communities can meet their different but interrelated objectives. Yet, there is a need to recognise that greater engagement by the development community will not be achieved by launching a new marketing campaign and trying to sell what is already considered a faulty product more effectively, or simply tinkering with the name in the hope that non one notices the ‘alternative development’ product has actually passed its ‘sell-by-date’. Instead, there is a need for the proponents of alternative development to learn from the wider development community in terms of conceptual frameworks, understanding the nature of change in rural livelihoods, and in particular, to recognise that the more traditional project type intervention has its limitations and that a wider-sectoral approach is required to build an enabling policy environment for development efforts to have make a real impact. At the same time, there is a need for the development community to move way from what can be a rather unsophisticated and outdated model of the ‘profit maximising illicit drug farmer’ and further its understanding of the complex role that illicit drug crops play in the livelihoods of the rural poor. This Discussion paper is aimed at promoting just such an understanding between both communities. Indeed, it is targeted at a wider development community that has often been at best suspicious of the illicit drug issues and a drug control community that has often proved insular and unable to draw on the lessons learned from the implementation of more conventional rural development interventions over the last decade. The paper is intended to provoke both communities into a more constructive dialogue: a dialogue that is aimed more at developing a deeper understanding of the considerable overlap between drug control and development agendas; and that promotes partnership – no longer based on the distinct and rather artificial discipline of ‘alternative development’ in which neither development nor drug control community have ownership – but based on agreed principles of integrating an analysis of the causes of illicit drug crop cultivation into conventional development programmes, a common understanding of how development outcomes can translate into drug control achievements, and an ethos of doing ‘development in a drugs environment’. Details: Eschborn/Germany: Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ), 2006. 40p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed November 9, 2010 at: http://www.davidmansfield.org/data/Alternative_Development/GTZ/strategic_approach.pdf Year: 2006 Country: Asia URL: http://www.davidmansfield.org/data/Alternative_Development/GTZ/strategic_approach.pdf Shelf Number: 120269 Keywords: Drug ControlNarcoticsOpiumPoppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: Governance, Security and Economic Growth: The Determinants of Opium Poppy Cultivation in the Districts of Jurm and Baharak in Badakhshan Summary: As this report shows the evidence from the centre of Baharak district in Badakhshan is that given the right conditions many households can prosper despite ceasing or significantly reducing opium poppy cultivation. Opium poppy remains an input intensive crop. Not only does land have to be set aside for its cultivation but also water, seed, farm power and most importantly of all labour. When the opportunity cost of allocating these inputs to opium production rise due to the growth in the market for high value vegetable production, the recovery of livestock prices and significant increases in wage labour opportunities, households can make the shift from opium poppy cultivation to legal economic opportunities without enduring economic and political shocks. For instance, it no longer looks as economically attractive to allocate family members to work on such a labour intensive crop as opium poppy cultivation when salaried employment and consistent wage labour opportunities are available, particularly when opium prices are falling. Neither does it make sense to hire a workforce for opium poppy cultivation to substitute for this now gainfully employed family labour given relatively high wage labour rates. Instead it is rational to cultivate less labour intensive crops that can be managed largely utilising the remaining supply of household labour. Of course it is even more conducive to the household if these crops fetch good prices, attract traders to purchase them at the farmgate and obtain advance payments, as is currently the case in central Baharak. Land can also be allocated to fodder crops that are again less labour intensive and serve to increase the value added of livestock which has seen a recovery in prices and market size. As such, combining wage labour opportunities with high value cash crops and livestock production not only has the potential to generate a higher return to household resources but can also offer greater security than simply cultivating opium poppy. Of course in this scenario ‘security’ is not only a function of the different income streams available which act as a safety net against crop or market failure, but also a consequence of the household operating within the ‘rule of law’ and therefore less vulnerable to the potential excesses of both state and non-state actors. In this situation a household will also more often than not be a recipient of public goods such as education, health, physical infrastructure, as well as physical security which all serve to improve economic opportunities and extend social contract between the state and community. As experience in other former opium poppy growing areas in countries like Thailand and Pakistan illustrate once these gains are consolidated farmers are unlikely to return to opium production even when famgate prices increase significantly. However, this paper also shows that the opportunity cost of allocating household resources to opium poppy is not rising for all, indeed these development are typically highly localised and concentrated around central Baharak. In contrast in the more remote areas of Baharak district and across much of the neighbouring district of Jurm, circumstances are such that agricultural commodity and labour markets remain constrained. Limited natural assets, such as land and water, combined with poor roads and high transportation costs preclude the shift to high value vegetable production. Some recovery in livestock is taking place but the benefits of this tend to be concentrated amongst the relatively wealthy who have often restocked their herds using the proceeds from their opium crop. In these areas opium poppy persists all be it at lower levels than in 2006. In the more remote parts of the district of Baharak there is potential for opium to cease once infrastructure is improved, and more marginal households restock their herds and gain better access to labour markets through a growth in labour demand and/or skill development. Wage labour opportunities in Iran will continue to be seen as an important safety valve for households who cannot meet their basic needs by participating in local agricultural and labour markets. In the district of Jurm the prognosis is more bleak. The biggest constraint on reducing opium poppy in this area is the insecurity and poor governance that is currently stymieing the growth of the legal economy. Here the political and financial interests of competing commanders will only serve to continue high levels of dependency on opium production and prevent households making sustainable shifts to legal economic options. There is a danger that the growing insecurity in the centre of the district has a knock on effect in the upper areas in which currently the local commanders remain relatively inactive. In the centre of Jurm the uncertain political and security environment is already impacting on investment decisions. Attempts by the local and central authorities to reduce opium poppy cultivation are viewed with disdain and seen as part of a wider attempt by local commanders to reinforce their political and economic grip over the area. It is also impacting on the legal economy reducing disposable income and subsequently sales and employment opportunities. This in turn is further weakening the relationship between the state and local communities. As such there is a real risk that the political need for short-term results on levels of cultivation could undermine attempts to deliver sustainable development and counter narcotics outcomes. In such an environment greater focus needs to be given to stabilising the security and governance environment through anti corruption measures and extending service delivery, as well as promoting economic growth. It would appear that counter narcotics efforts such as eradication efforts may well have to wait until these pre-requisites are put in place and farmers have viable alternatives to opium poppy cultivation. Details: Germany: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ), 2007. 35p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed November 9, 2010 at: http://www.gtz.de/de/dokumente/en-eod-report-Badakhshan.pdf Year: 2007 Country: Afghanistan URL: http://www.gtz.de/de/dokumente/en-eod-report-Badakhshan.pdf Shelf Number: 120270 Keywords: EconomicsNarcoticsOpiumPoppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: Poppy Free Provinces: A Measure or a Target? Summary: This report focuses on the concept of “poppy free” provinces — an increasingly important metric by which performance in counter-narcotics in Afghanistan is currently being judged. It is based on the fourth consecutive year of fieldwork conducted in the provinces of Nangarhar and Ghor under the auspices of the Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit’s Applied Thematic Research into Water Management, Livestock and the Opium Economy project, known in short as “WOL” and funded by the European Commission. The report does not offer a synthesis of the previous years of fieldwork undertaken, although clearly it draws on the body of knowledge established by this work. The report details the processes by which two provinces achieved what the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has come to refer to as “poppy free” status1 in the 2007/08 growing season. The two provinces are Nangarhar in the East of the country and Ghor in the central region. These are two markedly different provinces, not only from the perspective of the resources that the population have at their disposal, but also in the scale and depth of their engagement in the production and trade in opium. Matching the contrast in resources and engagement in opium poppy cultivation is the way in which Nangarhar and Ghor achieved their “poppy free” status in 2007/08 and the subsequent impact on the socioeconomic and political situation in these two provinces. The report contrasts the way in which these two provinces became opium poppy free in the 2007/08 growing season. It highlights the proactive role played by the Governor of Nangarhar in banning opium poppy: his use of coercion, persuasion and tribal structures to create an environment in which the population was not confident that there was sufficient unity within the tribes to prevent the opium crop being destroyed were they to plant it. The report also outlines how early eradication in key districts served to increase this perception of risk and, when combined with a successful attempt by the local authorities to create the impression that the heightened profile of the Unites States military in the province was primarily aimed at counter-narcotics rather than counterinsurgency, succeeded in deterring planting across Nangarhar. The report highlights how the situation in Ghor could not be more different. Here, the negligible levels of cultivation were the consequence of environmental and market forces. It shows how low opium yields and falling farm-gate prices have acted against opium poppy and, in the wake of dramatic increases in wheat prices in the 2007/08 growing season, have made it irrational to cultivate opium poppy. The reports shows that those who persist with cultivation typically do so because they have no other sources of cash income. Details: Kabul: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit, 2009. 37p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed April 19, 2011 at: http://www.humansecuritygateway.com/documents/AREU_PoppyFreeProvinces_MeasureOrTarget.pdf Year: 2009 Country: Afghanistan URL: http://www.humansecuritygateway.com/documents/AREU_PoppyFreeProvinces_MeasureOrTarget.pdf Shelf Number: 121398 Keywords: Drug PolicyNarcotics ControlOpium Poppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: Where Have All the Flowers Gone? Assessing the Sustainability of Current Reductions in Opium Production in Afghanistan Summary: Levels of opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan have fallen for two consecutive years and it now appears that cultivation will be maintained at this relatively low level for another year. While this allows for progress to be declared against more short-term, area-based counter-narcotics targets, the reasons for the continued decline in cultivation are far from clear. This paper illustrates that current reductions are the result of complex economic, political and environmental processes that are both contextspecific and difficult to maintain. It argues that the coincidence of actions and events that have led to the current fall in production have set in play their own dynamic that could further destabilise parts of rural Afghanistan if not held in check. The paper is divided into three sections. Section 1 draws on detailed fieldwork in two distinct provinces as a way of exploring the different factors that lie behind the current reductions in opium production in Afghanistan. It shows how reductions in Nangarhar are largely a consequence of the concerted efforts of the current governor and the political deals he has struck with tribal leaders, local powerbrokers and to some extent the US military, whereas in Helmand the reductions in cultivation are primarily driven by shifts in the terms of trade between wheat and poppy and continuing concerns over food security. Section 2 explores the resilience of these reductions. It initially examines what opium poppy has been replaced with and highlights that reductions based on wheat are precarious and unlikely to be sustained. The section goes on to analyse the unfolding political environment in Afghanistan and how it might impact levels of opium production in the future, suggesting that the current political settlements that have been critical for reducing opium poppy in provinces such as Nangarhar and Balkh remain fragile and highly dependent on incumbent governors. The final section looks at the current policy environment for counter-narcotics. It suggests that counter-narcotics efforts and objectives have largely been relegated in Afghanistan, where counter-insurgency reigns supreme. This is not completely unwelcome because it has forced the drug control community to evaluate their interventions not simply based on the achievement of short-term, area-based targets but to consider the complex relationship between the achievement of counter-narcotics objectives and the broader goals of improving governance, security and economic growth. However, tensions still exist and this paper suggests that the trajectory of counter-narcotics policy is far from clear, particularly if production were to rise in the 2010/11 growing season. Details: Kabul, Afghanistan: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit, 2010. 24p. Source: Internet Resource: Briefing Paper Series: Accessed July 2, 2011 at: http://www.hks.harvard.edu/cchrp/sbhrap/research/pdf/Wherehavealltheflowersgone.pdf Year: 2010 Country: Afghanistan URL: http://www.hks.harvard.edu/cchrp/sbhrap/research/pdf/Wherehavealltheflowersgone.pdf Shelf Number: 121955 Keywords: Drug Abuse and AddictionDrug Control PolicyOpium (Afghanistan)Poppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: Managing Concurrent and Repeated Risks: Explaining the Reductions in Opium Production in Central Helmand between 2008 and 2011 Summary: Since 2008 the amount of land cultivated with opium in Helmand province has fallen by an estimated thirty seven per cent. Further dramatic reductions are anticipated in the canal command area of the province in the 2010/11 growing season. These reductions in opium poppy cultivation in central Helmand have occurred at the same time as the deployment of a growing number of national and international troops in the province, changing levels of violence, dramatic shifts in the terms of trade between opium poppy and wheat, the disbursement of increasing amounts of development assistance and the launch of a counter narcotics effort known as the ‘Food Zone Programme’. In this complex environment where so many variables are potentially influencing farmers in their cropping choices, it is difficult to identify the underlying causes of the reduction in opium production without conducting detailed research over a number of years. This Study represents such a body of analytical work and was commissioned to answer two specific questions: (1) what has driven the recent reductions in opium poppy cultivation in Helmand province; and (2) how sustainable will these reductions be? The Study also offers a series of recommendations for policy development and the implementation of programmes that can deliver a more enduring counter narcotics outcome without undermining current stabilisation efforts. The Study draws on both remote sensing and household data collected over a three year period and focuses on twenty three distinct research sites located in the rural areas of the districts of Nahre Seraj, Nad e Ali, Lashkar Gah, Marjeh and Nawa Barakzai in central Helmand. These particular research sites offer sharply contrasting socio-economic, political and environmental conditions that allow the reductions in levels of opium poppy cultivation within the province to be examined, as well as the identification of the differing impact of these reductions on households with different resource endowments and divergent exposure to risk and uncertainty. For example, some sites located in the environs of the cities of Gereshk and Lashkar Gah have experienced an improvement in security, gained from enhanced service provision and an expansion in their portfolio of livelihood activities over the period of the Study. Other research sites are located beyond the environs of the urban areas and have been exposed to repeated and concurrent shocks, such as chronic conflict, a ban on opium production, and a dramatic increase in wheat prices, over the period of the research. Finally there are research sites where the Taliban dominate, where opium persists and where livelihood options are severely limited by environmental factors. Details: London: Independent Drug Policy Consortium, 2011. 112p. Source: Internet Resource: August 1, 2011 at: http://www.idpc.net/sites/default/files/library/Managing-concurrent-and-repeated-risks.pdf Year: 2011 Country: Afghanistan URL: http://www.idpc.net/sites/default/files/library/Managing-concurrent-and-repeated-risks.pdf Shelf Number: 122242 Keywords: Drug Control PolicyNarcoticsOpium (Afghanistan)Poppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: All Bets are Off! Prospects for (B)reaching Agreements and Drug Control in Helmand and Nangarhar in the run up to Transition Summary: The issue of illicit drug production has largely fallen off the policy agenda in Afghanistan. In addition to the increasing focus on the part of Afghanistan’s foreign partners on an exit strategy, this has been to a considerable extent due to a favourable trend in the short-term metrics by which the drugs issue is typically judged. Levels of opium poppy cultivation have seen a reduction from their peak of 197,000 hectares (ha) in 2007 to 123,000 ha in 2010. There has also been a steady increase in the number of provinces where cultivation is negligible and which are classified as “poppy free.” Even a slight increase in cultivation in 2011 to 131,000 ha went largely unnoticed, as did the recurrence of cultivation in the provinces of Kapisa, Baghlan, and Faryab after years of being “poppy free.” It is plausible that even the 2012 figures, and the estimated 18 percent increase in the area under cultivation, can be “handled” by emphasising the 36 percent fall in opium production between 2011 and 2012 - even if it was due to an unprecedented cold snap in March 2012. It seems that amidst the plans for transition by the International Security Assistance Forces (ISAF), concerns over the electoral process, and the cumulative impact of the war, with increases in both civilian casualties and the number of Western soldiers being killed, the uptick in cultivation continues to be of little immediate concern to Western policymakers and politicians. Drawing on in-depth fieldwork in the provinces of Helmand and Nangarhar, this report reveals that unfortunately such complacency is completely unjustified. In the simplest terms, this report reveals that cultivation in both Helmand and Nangarhar has risen in the 2011-12 growing season, raising doubt as to whether both provinces have an effective model for longterm drug control in Afghanistan. Of far greater concern are the different socioeconomic and political processes that lie behind this rise in cultivation, and what it means for both opium production and stability in the run up to transition, as well as beyond then, after Western combat operations have ceased in December 2014. The report highlights the fragility of the recent reductions in opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan. Then, through an analysis of the different factors that have led to an increase in cultivation in Helmand and Nangarhar in the 2011-12 growing season, it offers insight into how important the illegal drugs trade will to be in the political economy of a post-transition Afghanistan. In particular, the report illustrates just how closely opium poppy cultivation is entangled in the socioeconomic and political fabric of the provinces of Helmand and Nangarhar. It highlights how difficult it is to maintain the kinds of bargains that provincial governors have made with the rural elite to elicit their support to reduce opium poppy in areas where the welfare of the rural population is deteriorating and where the government does not have preponderant control over the means of violence. The report shows that it is under these very conditions that the current administration’s desire to ban opium poppy has led to “over-governing”—striving to extend its reach into physical space where it has little history of direct engagement, where the relationship between the state and the rural elite has been at its most fragile, and where past attempts to impose central rule on the population have led to violent repercussions. Ultimately, the report outlines two very different trajectories involving different populations in both provinces. One trajectory applies to populations in areas where the Afghan state has a history of effective control over the rural population, achieved through the rural elite whose interests largely align with those in state power. In these areas, resource endowments and market opportunities permit a sustained shift out of opium production, and it is in these areas that the state and its ban on poppy can prevail. The second trajectory charts a very different course. It applies to populations that have a history of armed resistance against state intervention, an egalitarian tribal system, and an internally divided, competing, and unstable rural elite that includes political adversaries who are keen to capitalise on the failures of their opponents. These are areas where livelihood opportunities are severely constrained by terrain, an effective distance from markets, and have limited resource endowments. In these areas, imposing a ban on opium production has presented the provincial and local political leadership with a significant challenge given that such bans have impoverished the rural population and compelled them to pursue coping strategies that expose them to physical risks, and have led to growing hostility toward the Afghan government and its foreign backers. It is in these areas that, in the absence of foreign military support after December 2014, if not before, the state will have little choice but to rescind its opium ban, retreat to the lowland valleys, and explore new ways to engage with the population and rural elite if it is not to find itself incre asingly besieged. The report shows that based on the evidence from Helmand and Nangarhar, rather than extending the writ of the Afghan government, as some suggest has happened, expanding bans on opium across an ever increasing geographical area, regardless of the socioeconomic and political conditions, has in fact undermined state formation, increased rural discontent, and presented new opportunities for the insurgency. This process, and the resurgence of opium poppy cultivation post-2014, will have major implications for the Afghan state and in turn implications for Western nations who plan to continue to provide development assistance and support to the Afghan state. Details: Kabul: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit, 2013. 116p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed January 31, 2013 at: http://www.areu.org.af/Uploads/EditionPdfs/1302%20Opium%2023%20Jan-Final.pdf Year: 2013 Country: Afghanistan URL: http://www.areu.org.af/Uploads/EditionPdfs/1302%20Opium%2023%20Jan-Final.pdf Shelf Number: 127466 Keywords: Drug Control (Afghanistan)Drug TraffickingOpium TradePoppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: Eyes Wide Shut: Counter-Narcotics in Transition Summary: It is now clear that the production and trade of opiates will have a significant influence on not only the economic, political and security landscape, but even the physical terrain of post-Transition Afghanistan. Levels of opium poppy cultivation are already rising; estimated cultivated area rose by 18 percent in 2012 and is likely to rise significantly over the next few years. And this trend may intensify further as politico-military actors make deals and form coalitions in response to the 2014 handover of security responsibility from the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) to the Afghan National Security Forces (ANSF). Even while NATO forces remain, the coercive power of the Afghan state has diminished in parts of provinces previously described as "models" for counter-narcotics efforts. In provinces such as Helmand and Nangarhar, there is likely to be a return to widespread opium poppy cultivation in the more accessible and fertile areas as NATO and the ANSF cease to operate outside the areas where the state has a history of control. As security forces withdraw, the state has either relinquished control of such territory to anti-government elements (AGEs), or delegated it to local power brokers who may have little interest in reducing opium poppy cultivation, and may even encourage it. Further increases in cultivation are also likely as opium poppy returns in greater amounts to some of the provinces previously deemed "poppy free," such as Ghor, Laghman and even Balkh. Perhaps more worrying is the potential for an expansion of opium into previously uncultivated areas of desert land in the South. The adoption of new technologies-such as deep wells, herbicides and solar power-will likely aid cultivation in these areas, reducing the cost of inputs and increasing productivity. Meanwhile, ill-sequenced and poorly-targeted counter-narcotics and development efforts coupled with a continuing global demand for opiates provide additional incentives for production. Increasing levels of cultivation have wider implications for the political economy of the country. In an increasingly contested rural space, narcotics and counter-narcotics policies are both likely to be a major source of patronage and division. The Taliban have a history of actively encouraging opium poppy cultivation as part of a strategy to gain the support of the rural population and highlight the weakness of provincial administration. By provoking crop destruction as part of counter-narcotics efforts, this strategy also increases rural antipathy to the state and its international partners. The myriad different local security forces operating under the sometimes loose supervision of Afghan and international military forces are less coherent. In some areas of Kandahar and Helmand the Afghan Local Police (ALP) are pursuing an aggressive counter-narcotics effort, conscious that they may lose their salaries and patronage if they do not. In other parts of these provinces as well as in Balkh, farmers allege that members of the ALP and even the Afghan Border Police either benefit from poppy cultivation or grow it themselves. Details: Kabul, Afghanistan: Afghanistan Research And Evaluation Unit, 2013. 28p. Source: Internet Resource: Briefing Paper Series: Accessed April 23, 2014 at: http://www.areu.org.af/Uploads/EditionPdfs/Opium%20BP.pdf Year: 2013 Country: Afghanistan URL: http://www.areu.org.af/Uploads/EditionPdfs/Opium%20BP.pdf Shelf Number: 132135 Keywords: Drug Abuse and AddictionDrug Control PolicyNarcoticsOpiumPoppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: "From Bad They Made It Worse": The concentration of opium poppy in areas of conflict in the provinces of Helmand and Nangarhar Summary: Levels of drug crop cultivation have long been seen as an indicator of the success or failure of counternarcotics efforts. However, to rely on this indicator is to misunderstand the socioeconomic and political processes that support farmers moving out of opium poppy cultivation, as well as the limited scope of many interventions currently categorized and budgeted as "counternarcotics" by the international community and the Government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (GIRoA). Details: Kabul: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit, 2014. 92p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed June 26, 2014 at: http://www.areu.org.af/Uploads/EditionPdfs/NRM%20CS6%20ver%202%20(2).pdf Year: 2014 Country: Afghanistan URL: http://www.areu.org.af/Uploads/EditionPdfs/NRM%20CS6%20ver%202%20(2).pdf Shelf Number: 132549 Keywords: Drug Abuse and AddictionDrug ControlOpium Poppy CultivationPoppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: The Devil is in the Details: Nangarhar's continued decline into insurgency, violence and widespread drug production Summary: Nangarhar - a province that historically has been one of the major entry points for the capture of Kabul - is in complete disarray. It lies in chaos, riven by a process of political fragmentation that has increased in both pace and severity since the presidential elections and the formation of the National Unity Government (NUG). In fact, there seems little to currently bind the province together given the faltering economy, a reduction in aid flows and the continued disassembling of the political alliances that maintained stability during the early years of Gul Aga Sherzai's governorship. Further catalysing this are the drawdown and subsequent closure of the US-led Provincial Reconstruction Team (PRT) - an institution that was, for a period of time, a guarantor for the Afghan state in the province. Indeed, without US military support, and with little direction from Kabul, the Afghan National Defence Security Forces (ANDSF) appear reluctant to leave the sanctuary of their fortified bases. This has led to further losses in government-held territory, particularly in the districts south of the main highway, which runs east to west linking Kabul to the Pakistan border at Torkham. Details: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit, 2016. 18p. Source: Internet Resource: Brief: Accessed February 17, 2016 at: http://www.areu.org.af/Uploads/EditionPdfs/1602E%20The%20Devil%20is%20in%20the%20Details%20Nangarhar%20continued%20decline%20into%20insurgency.pdf Year: 2016 Country: Afghanistan URL: http://www.areu.org.af/Uploads/EditionPdfs/1602E%20The%20Devil%20is%20in%20the%20Details%20Nangarhar%20continued%20decline%20into%20insurgency.pdf Shelf Number: 137856 Keywords: Drug-Related ViolenceIllegal DrugsNarcotics Natural Resources OpiumPoppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: Understanding Control and Influence: What Opium and Tax Reveal about the Writ of the Afghan State Summary: There are a number of organisations that have sought to map government control in Afghanistan. However, given the frequency it is cited in the media and official reports, this paper offers a critique of the current way that North Atlantic Treaty Organization's (NATO) and US Forces in Afghanistan (USFOR-A) measure government influence and control in Afghanistan. It describes the limits of the current approach within the confines of what is currently known about the methodology. It shows that the concept of state or insurgent "control" over a population or area jars not only with historical understandings of the State in Afghanistan, but also contemporary events across large swathes of the country. It also illustrates how the categories adopted by USFOR-A - "state influence", "insurgent influence" and "contested" - are not mutually exclusive, and argues that district wide assessments do not offer sufficient granular detail to understand how the insurgency gains influence in an area, strengthens its position in rural communities before consolidating its position and encircling a district or provincial center. Details: Kabul: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit AREU, 2017. 70p. Source: Internet Resource: Accessed November 15, 2017 at: https://areu.org.af/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/1724E-Understanding-Control-and-Influence1.pdf Year: 2017 Country: Afghanistan URL: https://areu.org.af/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/1724E-Understanding-Control-and-Influence1.pdf Shelf Number: 148184 Keywords: Illegal Drugs Illicit Crops Opium Opium Poppy Poppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: Still Water Runs Deep: Illicit Poppy and the Transformation of the Deserts of Southwest Afghanistan Summary: The physical and political geography of the deserts of southwest Afghanistan have gone through dramatic change over the last two decades. Located on the periphery of irrigated lands settled by the Afghan state in the 1950s and 1960s, this area has been at the forefront of technological change in Afghan agricultural production since 2003. Initially settled by small numbers of households escaping drought in the 1990s, large tracts of these former desert lands were then captured by local elites and their communities from the adjacent irrigated lands. With access to improved technologies, including deep wells and diesel pumps, and a buoyant opium price, dry rocky soils were transformed into viable agricultural land. An added impetus for further encroachment and development of these former desert lands came in 2008 when the Afghan state-with the help of foreign military forces-coerced the rural population to abandon the opium crop in accessible irrigated areas. These counternarcotics efforts served to evict the land-poor from the provinces of Helmand, Farah and Kandahar, leaving them few options but to seek new lives in the former desert areas. For those that owned land in the former desert areas, this supply of relatively cheap labour skilled in opium production encouraged a further expansion in poppy cultivation, further increasing the total agricultural area and the economic value of their properties. Even with repeated low yields between 2010 and 2014, and fluctuating prices, farmers in these former desert areas adapted and innovated, exploiting herbicides and solar technology from China to reduce opium production costs and further increase the amount of land under cultivation. As this paper argues, these former desert areas should not be seen as marginal and remote, but understood as engines of growth integrated into the global economic system; these are areas that have been transformed by improved access to technologies and an entrepreneurial population that has fully exploited the opportunities opium production has offered. Details: Kabul: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit, 2018. 40p. Source: Internet Resource: Issues Paper: Accessed June 12, 2018 at: https://areu.org.af/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/1808E-STILL-WATER-RUNS-DEEP-Illicit-Poppy-and-the-Transformation-of-the-Deserts-of-Southwest-Afghanistan.pdf Year: 2018 Country: Afghanistan URL: https://areu.org.af/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/1808E-STILL-WATER-RUNS-DEEP-Illicit-Poppy-and-the-Transformation-of-the-Deserts-of-Southwest-Afghanistan.pdf Shelf Number: 150523 Keywords: Illegal Drugs Illicit Crops Opium Poppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: Stirring Up the Hornet's Nest: How the Population of Rural Helmand view the current Counterinsurgency Campaign Summary: A central tenet of US counter-insurgency during the Bush and Obama administrations was "winning the hearts and minds" of the population. This was termed a "population-centred" approach and was informed by a strategy of "clear, hold and build," in which coalition and Afghan forces would clear insurgents from a given territory, then hold it while their influence was mitigated, and invest in the development and governance of the area. The assumption was that such a strategy would gain the support of the population. Between 2008 and 2012, Helmand province was a focal point for just such a population-centred counterinsurgency effort. It was estimated that between 2009 and 2011, more than US$648 million was spent in the province in tandem with an inflow of over 20,000 US marines, as well as UK, Danish, and Afghan military forces.2 As early as late 2009, the district of Nawa Barakzai, just south of the provincial capital of Lashkar Gah, became an emblem of counter-insurgency efforts and cited as an exemplar of the merits of "putting the population first." The approach was then replicated in the neighbouring districts of Nad e Ali and Marjah when over 3,000 US marines, 1,200 soldiers from the UK and 4,400 Afghan forces deployed under Operation Moshtarak in February 2010, while millions of dollars were spent on physical and social infrastructure. Levels of violence declined, but any gains were short-lived following the departure of international military forces in the summer of 2014, which diminished the mobility of the Afghan National Defense and Security Forces (ANDSF). Development investments in central Helmand also dwindled along with the associated donor funds. By the fall of 2016, the insurgency had once again made major inroads, ANDSF had abandoned security checkpoints in Nad e Ali, Marjah and Nawa Barakzai and there were few rural development projects. In the wake of the Trump administration's debates over the future of US assistance to Afghanistan, a new counter-insurgency strategy-the South Asia Policy-came into play. Armed with a change in presidential authorities that supported a more aggressive military position against insurgent forces and those believed to be financing them, the United States Forces Afghanistan (USFOR-A), in the words of its commander General Nicholson, would take "the fight to the enemy in all its dimensions." This paper documents how this new strategy is perceived by the rural population of central Helmand, both in the canal-irrigated areas of Marjah, Nawa Barakzai, Nahre Seraj and Nad Ali and in the former desert areas north of the Boghra canal. It is based on the results of fieldwork in rural Helmand in May 2018 and high-resolution imagery. The paper emphasises how, by the turn of 2018, central Helmand was once again a battleground in which the population was not the prize-to coin the phrase used by proponents of population-centric counterinsurgency-but the perceived victims of a campaign of protracted violence that many farmers believe is at the behest of US and Afghan military forces. The paper also suggests that antagonism toward the government and the uptick in violence were exacerbated by a campaign of air strikes targeting heroin labs, a dramatic downturn in opium prices and a worsening economic situation. The allegations of corruption frequently levelled at Afghan officials and security forces without any notable investments in physical or social infrastructure only serve to further alienate the rural population from a government that is thought to only "fill its own pockets." The paper concludes that, in this environment, the US and Afghan government forces may be able to clear parts of central Helmand of insurgent forces, and even hold the area for a time, but there is little to suggest this strategy will win the support of the population. Finally, recommendations are offered. Details: Kabul: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit, 2018. 30p. Source: Internet Resource: Issues Paper: Accessed November 16, 2018 at: https://areu.org.af/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/1814E-STIRRING-UP-THE-HORNET%E2%80%99S-NEST.pdf Year: 2018 Country: Afghanistan URL: https://areu.org.af/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/1814E-STIRRING-UP-THE-HORNET%E2%80%99S-NEST.pdf Shelf Number: 153494 Keywords: Illegal DrugsIllicit CropsOpium Poppy EradicationPoppy Cultivation |
Author: Mansfield, David Title: High and Dry: Poppy cultivation and the future of those that reside in the former desert areas of South West Afghanistan Summary: The deserts of southwestern Afghanistan have been transformed. Land that was once dry and strewn with rocks, has been cleared, irrigated, and planted with crops by an influx of new settlers. The pace of the settlement of the former desert areas of the southwest is such that by 2018 there was an additional 357,885 hectares of agricultural land compared to 2002, and possibly as many as 3.6 million people residing there. And at a time when the north of the country is experiencing a dramatic drought, a further 29,000 hectares of land came under cultivation in the former deserts of the southwest between 2017 and 2018. In fact, more land was cultivated in the former desert north of the Boghra Canal in Helmand in 2018 than ever before, and there were further signs of migration into the area from farmers looking to escape the uptick in violence in the canal irrigated area following the government's efforts to recapture parts of Nad Ali. The change is such that the former desert lands north of the of the Boghra in Helmand are almost indistinguishable from those areas to the south where US$ 75 million, much of it provided by the United States, was invested in more than 200 km of irrigation canals over a three-decade period. Increased access to technology, relatively low land prices-and at least in the area north of the Boghra Canal-a recovery of opium yields-continue to draw people into these former desert lands. The population has dug in. The markets, that once straddled the Boghra canal, and thereby served both the populations of the desert to the north and the irrigated areas to the south, have lost their importance. Permanent markets have been established deep in the former desert area, north of the canal, reflecting the changing face of central Helmand, the growth in the settled population in these former empty spaces, and the increasing purchasing power of those that live there. However, despite these obvious gains the productivity of these former desert places - and thereby the lives of the population that reside there - is precarious. In recent years the uptick in technology such as herbicides and the use of solar technology to power deep wells has helped farmers overcome falling yields and lower production costs. But at the same time these developments pose a threat to agricultural sustainability and the livelihoods of the population in these former desert areas. The ground water that the area relies on is falling at an increasing rate with the growth in solar-powered technology and there are signs that it is contaminated with nitrates. This paper draws on detailed fieldwork and imagery in 2018 to document the changes in the lives and livelihoods of the population in these rapidly expanding former desert areas of the southwest. It traces changes in agricultural practice, governance and the experiences of the population, both men and women, to illustrate how fragile life is for those living in these former desert areas and the vulnerability of the population. The paper is pioneering in its efforts to document the lives and livelihoods of women in these former desert areas where prevailing levels of insecurity, the tradition of seclusion, and the challenges of conducting fieldwork in the remote former desert spaces mean that this is a population group whose voices are rarely heard. The paper is divided into six sections. The first section outlines the methodology used to conduct research in such difficult and insecure terrain. The second section examines the contrasting histories of settlement of two former desert areas: the area north of the Boghra canal in Helmand and Bakwa, some 100 kilometers to the northwest. The third section looks at the changing face of governance in these former desert areas. It highlights just how incidental the government is to those that live in places like Bakwa and north of the Boghra and provides evidence of the insurgency's growing influence over the population's way of life in matters of security, justice, education, and even environmental policy. The fourth section details agricultural production over the winter of 2017-18 and highlights the critical role that opium production plays in the economic viability of these former desert areas. The fifth section documents the experiences of those that live in these former desert areas, with a particular focus on those women that migrate to the area north of the Boghra Canal on a seasonal basis. Finally, a conclusion is offered. Details: Kabul: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit, 2018. 46p. Source: Internet Resource: Issues Paper: Accessed November 16, 2018 at: https://areu.org.af/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/1817E-High-and-Dry-Poppy-cultivation-and-the-future-of-those-that-reside-in-the-former-desert-areas-of-South-West-Afghanistan.pdf Year: 2018 Country: Afghanistan URL: https://areu.org.af/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/1817E-High-and-Dry-Poppy-cultivation-and-the-future-of-those-that-reside-in-the-former-desert-areas-of-South-West-Afghanistan.pdf Shelf Number: 153495 Keywords: Illegal Drugs Illicit Crops Opium Poppy Cultivation |