BANGKOK (AP) According to United Nations experts, opium production in Myanmar, the world’s largest supplier of the illegal substance from which heroin is made, has slightly decreased. However, they cautioned that there are still plenty of opportunities for the deadly trade to grow in the future.
After three years of growth, the area under opium cultivation fell by 4% to 45,200 hectares (111,700 acres), and production fell by 8% to 995 metric tons as a result of a 4% decline in opium yield, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime’s Myanmar Opium Survey 2024.
Last year, the UNODC declared that Myanmar had surpassed Afghanistan as the world’s largest producer of opium, claiming that a prohibition imposed by the Taliban after its 2021 takeover had caused a 95% decline in opium cultivation in that country. Poppy flowers are used to extract opium, the raw material used to make heroin and morphine.
In the meantime, Myanmar saw an increase in production and cultivation between 2021 and 2023, which the UNODC mostly attributed to
encouraged by the turmoil that developed after its army overthrew Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected government in February 2021. The current civil war is the result of opposition to the takeover.
At a press briefing regarding the survey, which combined satellite surveillance and on-the-ground investigations, Masood Karimipour, UNODC Regional Representative for Southeast Asia and the Pacific, stated that many farmers who had abandoned opium cultivation during the time of relative stability prior to the military takeover had returned to it.
According to UNODC specialists, the effects of the supply disruption are still unknown.
“We think that the global heroin supply chain hasn’t been completely adjusted yet,” stated Inshik Sim, a UNODC Research Officer. Additionally, it is implied that since heroin is in short supply worldwide, someone must supply the markets, which could encourage Myanmar’s opium poppy farmers to grow more opium poppy.
But according to the UNODC, the fighting at the core of the instability grew so intense in 2024 that it might have limited output because of things like displacement and travel restrictions, as seems to be the case in the opium-producing areas of Shan and Kachin in eastern and northern Myanmar.
The U.N. experts noted that does not necessarily mean that production has stopped.
Unfortunately, there are signs that the situation in Myanmar is getting worse, which is also a cause for concern, Karimipour said. Therefore, more people may be forced into opium production as long as the political and humanitarian issues in Myanmar persist and the situation there is unstable.
Additionally, we observe that farmers have told us that their primary motivation is simply to put food on the table, and that the need for money will only get greater. Therefore, we do not anticipate a decline in the incentive to keep growing opium.
“The push factors that we just discussed will continue, so it’s very important for the international community to do what it can to support farming communities and build resilience outside the opium economy,” Karimipour said, adding that it’s crucial to keep an eye on the situation in Afghanistan and Myanmar in relation to the global heroin supply chains.
The notorious Golden Triangle, which is where the borders of Thailand, Laos, and Myanmar converge, includes northeastern Myanmar. Because of the anarchy in border areas where Myanmar’s central government has had little control over numerous ethnic minority groups, some of whom are partners in the drug trade, opium and heroin production has historically flourished there.
Opium production in the area declined in recent decades, and methamphetamine in tablet and crystal form replaced it. It is spread throughout Asia and the Pacific by land, sea, and air and is simpler to produce on an industrial scale than the labor-intensive production of opium.
The Associated Press, 2024. All rights reserved. All rights reserved. It is prohibited to publish, broadcast, rewrite, or redistribute this content without authorization.
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