SIDE EFFECTS HIT PLAN COLOMBIA

Local Officials And Campesinos Say That Fumigation Has Poisoned Thousands
Of Acres Of Food Crops And
Pastures, Devastated The Local Economy, And Sown Deep Resentment Among The
Rural Poor

LA CONCORDIA, Colombia -- Rigoberto Rosero was setting out a new crop of
plantains when his farm was doused in herbicide by police crop-dusters
escorted by US-made combat helicopters. Their target was his illegal
10-acre plot of coca, the tea-like bush which provides the raw material for
cocaine, but within days nearly every plant on Mr. Rosero's homestead
withered and died.

Nearly two months later, he still seems stunned as he walks past half-dead
orange trees, a shriveled stand of maize, and rows of skeletal coca plants.
"This was my life's work. I thought I could build something for my
children's future. But when something like this happens, you start to lose
hope."

As President Bush welcomes Colombian president Andres Pastrana to the White
House today, the largest anti-drugs offensive this country has ever seen is
rolling across the jungles and farmland of southern Colombia.

But the offensive's rapid success so far is raising concern that promised
food and development aid will not come quickly enough to give farmers like
Mr. Rosero a way to feed themselves and a legal alternative for making a
living.

The $ 1.3 billion strategy known as Plan Colombia kick-started in December
with an airborne assault on the Guamuez Valley deep in Putumayo state, a
lawless frontier region where clandestine laboratories churn out nearly
half of Colombia's cocaine.

The all-out offensive on the heart of the cocaine industry is part of a
five-year plan to cut back Colombia's drug production, and weaken the
leftist guerrillas and right-wing paramilitaries who finance their
operations with money from narcotics deals.

The Colombian government is calling the operation a resounding success -
72,500 acres of coca were destroyed in the first phase of the plan.

"People in the regions never thought they'd be fumigated, so they never
tried to change. Now they're annoyed because we have destroyed their coca,
so they're bound to complain," says presidential adviser Gonzalo de Francisco.

Against expectations, in the Guamuez Valley, home to the largest
concentration of coca crops on earth, there was little resistance from the
guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, partly because
right-wing militias - the army's de facto allies - launched a terror
campaign in the region late last year, driving out the rebels. Spraying
operations have now been launched in the rebel-dominated, neighboring state
of Caqueta. There, fumigation sorties have come under heavy ground fire,
and last week, an armed rescue unit - including US civilian contract
workers - braved guerrilla bullets to save the crew of a downed police
helicopter.

The incident underlined the risks implied in an increased US involvement in
a savage civil war, but most of the conflict's victims are still unarmed
civilians.

So far the brunt of the anti-narcotics campaign has been borne by small
farmers like Rosero.

Local officials and campesinos say that fumigation has poisoned thousands
of acres of food crops and pastures, devastated the local economy, and sown
deep resentment among the rural poor.

"The effects have been catastrophic. They sprayed the coca, but they also
killed all our food crops," says Miriam Rodriguez, a teacher at La
Concordia's two-room school.

Like the tin-roofed Catholic church and most of the houses in this tiny
village, the school was surrounded by coca crops. And when the crop-dusters
arrived on Jan. 6, it, too, was coated in herbicide.

This semester, the school won't be able to provide free lunches for the
poorest students because its kitchen garden was destroyed. Locals have
complained of skin rashes, headaches, and vomiting after exposure to the
clouds of Gliphosate, the weedkiller used in aerial eradication.

County officials have tallied more than 800 cases where indiscriminate
spraying has destroyed legal crops along with coca. Rosero's legal crops
used to be enough to feed his family, but like most farmers in the Guamuez
Valley, he says that he depended on coca as their only source of cash.

"I could have planted yucca, but nobody would have bought it. The
government doesn't understand that we campesinos are humans too, and we
have the right to make a living," he says.

In some regions, the government has signed a series of pacts promising
emergency food aid and long-term development assistance for small farmers
who destroy their own crops.

At today's meetings, President Pastrana is expected to ask the US for
further economic assistance and trade preferences, which he hopes will
boost the legal economy in drug-producing regions.

He has stressed that the campaign will only succeed if accompanied by
social development programs, but most of the first tranche of the US aid
went for helicopters, equipment, and training for the elite anti-narcotics
army battalions leading the current fumigation drive.

In the Guamuez Valley, meanwhile, emergency food deliveries described in
the plan have been irregular, and many locals say they have yet to receive
any help at all from the government. According to Alfonso Martinez, a
former mayor in the neighboring town of La Hormiga, many campesinos are
losing faith in the government's promises.

"Two months after they fumigated, we still haven't seen any aid. The
campesinos aren't getting any incentives [to legalize]," he says. Some are
replanting their illegal crops - this time with a new strain of high-yield
Peruvian coca.

"I understand the people's impatience, but the government hasn't let them
down," counters Mr. de Francisco, who is in charge of Plan Colombia's
social programs. He blames the delays on administrative problems with the
Colombian national budget.

"We have signed contracts with non-governmental organizations who will
manage the long-term development projects," he says. "There has been a
delay, but that's because we're setting up a social program which is
unprecedented in Colombia. We really believe we can solve Putumayo's problems."