Colombia aims to repeat 2020 coca eradication effort

BOGOTA: Colombia has set its sights on destroying 130,000ha of coca, the chief ingredient in cocaine, this year, matching eradication levels last year, President Ivan Duque said yesterday.

The South American country faces pressure from the United States, the main destination for cocaine, to counter coca cultivation. The area covered by coca crops soared to 212,000ha in 2019, giving a potential production output of 879 tonnes a year, according to the US Government. ``In 2020 we also seized more than 500 tonnes of cocaine hydrochloride, another objective we are keeping for 2021. The fight against drugs will continue to be a key focus and will continue to combine all the available tools,'' Duque said at the end of a security meeting in the Caribbean city of Cartagena.

Drug trafficking has long fed Colombia's internal armed conflict. Leftist guerrilla groups, criminal gangs and local cartels all make money from the trade, according to security sources.

PHOTO: REUTERS A coca plant is uprooted during an eradication operation at a plantation in Tumaco, Colombia last year.