Heady Times at the Bakery

Farmers going down with their crop

The poppy crop in Myanmar has gone down since the last year. The potential opium production has fallen from 370 tons to 312 tons. Though the decline is a good thing in the sense that less drugs will be produced, it hurts the local farmers. The people most affected by this will be the poor farmers. They rely on the high money yield from their crop because they do not have much room for farming. As the production of poppies declines the farmers will lose the small amount of money they earn and will not be able to supply the essential needs for their families.

But why must the farmers resort to poppy crop? Why not just grow their own food? This is simply because it is very hard to grow enough food for your family on the same amount of land whereas you could grow poppies and have enough money to purchase the food you need. This is why it would be very hard to eliminate poppy plantations in Myanmar. By taking away the income from the farmers and not replacing it with something that can yield the same income you would create a large humanitarian problem with thousands of starving people with no means to help themselves.

Myanmar Central Committee for Drug Abuse Control Police Chief Brigadier-General, Khin Yi, stressed the importance of food security and alternative method of income for the poppy-growing farmers. This would prevent the farmers from going back to cultivating poppy crop.

"Khin Yi, who is also CCDAC secretary, expressed Myanmar's commitment to maintaining the present momentum by relying on its own resources in the launching of a 15-year plan (1999-2014) on totally eradicating drugs in the country."

Source: Opium cultivation in Myanmar drops in 2005

posted by Simon @ 9:05 AM