Cocaine Which are producer countries of cocaine?

[the_void]

I know Peru, bolivia and columbia are .

is the climate of Central America and the Caribbean not suitable or something?

how about more south - Argentina’s, uruguay & chile ? Do these countries produce their own coke or import it?

thanks!

 

[Nurse Ratched]

@dalpat077 Right up your alley

 

[dalpat077]

I know Peru, bolivia and columbia are .

is the climate of Central America and the Caribbean not suitable or something?

how about more south - Argentina’s, uruguay & chile ? Do these countries produce their own coke or import it?

thanks!

Well there's two aspects to this unfortunately.


Growing Coca isn't the issue. Here's a list of countries (in addition to the three usual suspects mentioned) off the top of my head where Coca can be, and has been, grown or found:

Indonesia, Malaysia, Sri Lanka, Taiwan, Ecuador, Mexico, Honduras, Brazil, Paraguay, Venezuela, Guyana, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Cameroon, Congo, Madagascar.

The above by no means exhaustive i.e. a tropical climate and with some elevation is all that's required (elevation, from studies, appears to be key to alkaloid content and yield).

Without launching into a botany lesson here (already done on another thread some time ago): there's only two species of interest really i.e. Erythroxylum novogranatense and Erythroxylum coca. Of the two Erythroxylum novogranatense is the one usually found outside of its natural habitat (such being the three usual suspects mentioned) as it's more hardy and tolerant of hot conditions and is on par in terms of alkaloid yield when compared to Erythroxylum coca.


Producing without incurring the International wrath of all and sundry is another story altogether and therein lies the problem.

Cocaine in and of itself doesn't have real or significant value. It only becomes Gold in terms of street pricing. And that jump from approximately $2 000 USD per kg to approximately $20 000 USD per kg wholesale (not carved in stone but simply for the purposes of explanation) is made up of transport costs, bribery and corruption, and all the hangers on in-between. This never seems to occur to anyone i.e. always banging on about the poor farmers. Fact of the matter is that if you do the math: it adds up nice. As I've noted before (probably more than once): the main producers only make the money they do due to sheer volume and nothing else. And as noted: if you do the math, taking into account the amount of raw (plant) material that's required, not to mention everything else that's required, well then all of a sudden that $2 000 USD per kg at source isn't exactly easy money and neither is it over the top in terms of profit.


I'll leave it there i.e. I think I've answered the question(s) without resorting to losing my shit (from a sub-Saharan Africa socioeconomic and humanitarian point of view anyway) on this topic!