From our first front in the war on terror. How’s that working out for us, again?
… Afghanistan marred what would have otherwise been an encouraging story on the fight to reduce illegal global drug production, the [UN report (pdf)] said.
The country accounted for 92% of the world’s illegal opium production, up from 52% a decade earlier and 70% in 2000.
Exacerbating the problem, higher yields in Afghanistan, as compared to other opium producing regions, had lifted global opium production to a record high of 6,610 tonnes in 2006, a 43% increase from 2005. …
The article goes on to say that from 2005-2006, the land area devoted to poppy cultivation expanded by 59 percent.
We could consider doing something crazy with all that opium, the only reasonably compensated cash crop many Afghan farmers can grow, and buy it to turn into medicinal narcotic painkillers. But that’s just crazy talk. I mean, lords know, we wouldn’t want to do anything that would allow the impoverished farmers of Afghanistan to earn a living off of something besides criminal enterprise.