War on Drugs

FAILED STRATEGY CONNECTS AFGHAN FIELDS, CITY STREETS

In the coming months, under the leadership of the former U.S.
ambassador to Colombia, U.S. private contractors will likely attempt
to fumigate poppies in Afghanistan. Around the same time, the
Canadian government will decide whether to shut down the Insite
supervised injection site in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside.

The two policies are inextricably linked and unambiguously bad.

In April, the United States appointed William Wood, nicknamed
"Chemical Bill," its new ambassador to Afghanistan. In his previous
post, Wood championed and oversaw the fumigation of large swaths of
the Colombian countryside. The result? For every 67 acres sprayed,
only one acre of coca was eradicated. Moreover, production increased
by 36 per cent. In addition, the spraying negatively impacted
legitimate crops, contaminated water supplies and increased
respiratory infections among the exposed populations.

Wood is in Kabul for a single reason - to execute a similar plan in
Afghanistan. Poppy production, once held in check by the Taliban
government, is exploding - up 60 per cent in 2006. Poppies yield 10
times the value of wheat, so it is unsurprising that about 10 per
cent of an otherwise impoverished Afghan population partakes in the
illicit poppy harvest. It earns them upwards of $3 billion (U.S.) a
year, or roughly 65 per cent of Afghan GDP.

The short-term economic costs and long-term development and health
impacts of fumigation will be borne by those whose livelihoods are
both directly and indirectly connected to poppy cultivation.

Spraying could easily cause public opinion to turn against the Karzai
administration and NATO forces, further compromising the mission and
increasing the danger to Canadian soldiers.

Given the increased risks this policy poses to both our soldiers and
the overall mission, the government's silence is unconscionable.
Others have not been so quiet. British Prime Minister Gordon Brown
recently observed that there is little international support for
fumigation. He announced an alternative policy to wean farmers off of
opium, one that includes an ambitious plan to top up payments for
legal crops, such as wheat.

Such policies, however, are only part of a long-term project. Success
will require a holistic view, one that understands the connections
between the consumption of illicit drugs in places like Vancouver and
their cultivation in Afghanistan. Specifically, this means tackling
the demand for opiates. Although 90 per cent of world heroin comes
from Afghanistan, the vast majority is consumed in western countries.

Blaming Afghan farmers for the problem is as hypocritical as it is ineffective.

Reducing the cultivation of poppies in Afghanistan begins not on the
streets of Kandahar, but on the streets of Vancouver's Downtown Eastside.

Fortunately, such policies exist. Insite, Vancouver's supervised
injection site, offers a real first step toward reducing poppy
cultivation. This small storefront provides drug users with a
sanitary and safe place to inject in the presence of registered
nurses. The result: 21 peer-reviewed studies document how Insite
diminishes public drug use, reduces the spread of HIV and increases
the number of users who enter detox programs.

But Insite does more than get drug use off the street. It is a portal
into the health-care system for addicts who are too often shut out.
Drug users who visit Insite are an astounding 33 per cent more likely
to enlist in a detoxification program. Indeed, Insite has added a
second facility, called Onsite, that capitalizes on this success by
allowing drug users to immediately access detox and drug treatment
services on demand.

Sadly, the Harper government remains ideologically opposed to Insite.
It is unclear if the federal government possesses the legal authority
to close the site but there is significant concern it will attempt to
do so within six months.

The Conservatives should be looking to scale Insite nationally, not
contemplating its closing. A national network of injection sites
could dramatically reduce heroin use in Canada by channelling more
drug users into drug treatment programs. Diminishing the demand for
heroin would in turn devalue the poppies from which it is derived.
Changing this economic equation is both safer and more effective than
fumigation if the goal is shifting Afghan production from poppies to
legal crops. Admittedly, Canada's share of the global consumption of
heroin is relatively small, but our success could provide a powerful
and effective example to the international community.

To many Canadians, Afghanistan is a world away. But the lives of drug
users outside Vancouver's Carnegie Centre and those of our soldiers
in Kandahar are bound together - linked by the international opium
trade. What we do in Afghanistan shapes events in Vancouver's
Downtown Eastside, and vice versa. Canada's soldiers, drug users and
ordinary citizens deserve a government that recognizes this reality.