COLOMBIA COCAINE OUTPUT MAY BE HIGH, DESPITE SPRAYING

BOGOTA, Colombia -- Colombia is producing much more cocaine than suspected
- -- as much as the previously estimated total world output -- and the
massive U.S.-backed Plan Colombia spraying offensive has hardly made a
dent, a source familiar with the situation said.

Backed by almost $1 billion in mainly U.S. military aid, Plan Colombia
began in December 2000 and has sent U.S.-contracted crop-spraying planes
flying over dangerous jungle territory prowled by leftist guerrillas and
outlawed paramilitaries.

Plan Colombia's backers did not expect it to begin to reduce the total area
planted with cocaine's raw material, coca leaf, in its first year of operation.

But now a satellite study commissioned by the Colombian government and the
United Nations has found much more Colombian land sown with the illegal
stimulant than originally suspected.

Colombia can currently produce 800 to 900 tons of cocaine a year, and not
the 580 tons the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration estimated, the
source, who asked not to be identified, told Reuters.

That would mean Colombia is producing roughly as much cocaine as the
earlier 2000 estimate for total world output of 780 tons -- which also
includes Peru and Bolivia.

The head of Colombia's Anti-Drugs Police, Gen. Gustavo Socha, said he could
not confirm the source's data and that the study would not be ready until
the end of the week.

Satellite photographs of what appeared to be coca fields had to be analyzed
to ensure they were not really other types of cultivation or reflections of
nearby lakes, he said.

Plan Colombia has sprayed 75,000 acres with the herbicide glyphosate since
December, on top of almost 150,000 acres fumigated earlier in 2000.

But peasant planters, to whom coca can offer the small fortune of thousands
of dollars of annual income, appear to be sowing as fast as they are sprayed.

U.S. satellite data have suggested that there are about 335,000 acres under
cultivation with coca in Colombia. But the new study indicates there is
considerably more.

Officials believe Plan Colombia will start eating into the cocaine area
once it gets into full swing after the first full year.

Ten spray planes are now operating in Colombia -- up from four before Plan
Colombia. The number is set to double during the next year.

During the 1980s, Colombia's drug lords specialized in refining coca
imported from Peru and Bolivia. But coca plantations have moved into
Colombia to counter the success of U.S.-backed eradication schemes in those
two countries.