BUSINESS AS USUAL FOR AFGHAN DRUGS

Afghanistan is likely to retain a central role in the global drugs trade,
argues Mark Galeotti in this World Today essay. But even a miracle of
western statecraft would only lead to Afghanistan's impoverished neighbours
seizing a greater share of this lucrative trade.

Afghanistan's central role in the global narcotics trade will outlast bin
Laden and the Taliban. A powerful and flexible network of traffickers,
traders, producers and processors operates across factional, ethnic and
national borders with virtual impunity, and will play a key role in shaping
the post-intervention order. But the impact on the streets of Europe and
the global drugs market is likely to be minimal. Afghanistan provides
three-quarters of the world's opiates - the basis for heroin. Production
doubled through the 1990s thanks to a malign combination of poverty and
lawlessness, suitable local climate, a central location and, above all,
local figures and factions that eagerly embraced its economic opportunities.

Opium is grown freely in the countryside and gathered by farmers who sell
it to factories employed by, or paying off, the local warlord. It passes or
is sold on through anything up to a dozen different pairs of hands, as
stocks are consolidated into large shipments, which are then moved either
northwards through Central Asia or westwards via Iran. In the past two to
three years Afghanistan became not only a source of opium base but also a
centre for processing it into heroin. This refined form is much more
profitable, and more compact and thus easier to smuggle.

The Taliban made much of a campaign against opium production and
trafficking at the end of last year and indeed managed to eliminate the
majority of production in the areas under their control before lifting
prohibitions to raise funds when military action began. While the
restrictions drove up opium and heroin prices, there were no shortages in
the global market. Afghanistan's neighbours reported that the flow of
opiates out of the country only grew.

Partly this reflected the loose control of any Afghan government as many
semi-autonomous local groups who owed the Taliban notional allegiance
simply continued as before. But it also reflected a switch from fresh to
stockpiled opium. The UN has estimated that as much as sixty percent of
production may have been stockpiled each year since 1996, both as insurance
and also to keep prices high.

Active Alliance

The Northern Alliance and other anti-Taliban factions - especially ethnic
Pashtun groups in the east of the country - are whole-heartedly involved in
the trade. Indeed, if anything the Northern Alliance has been more closely
associated with narcotics than the Taliban.

The Taliban regime largely confined itself to taking a ten to twenty
percent levy on opium harvests, heroin production, and drug shipments,
earning it a minimum of $40-45 million annually. By contrast, the Northern
Alliance - or at least key figures in it - have actively engaged in the
production, sale and trafficking of opium for factional and personal gain.
Unofficial estimates from the Tajik authorities suggested that supplies
this year have been fairly evenly split between the Northern Alliance and
the Taliban, even though the Taliban controlled four times as much land
before November.

The situation is unlikely to change dramatically. Indeed, if anything it
may worsen. The post-Taliban government will presumably be pressured by the
west to combat the trade, but again it will have to hold together a
coalition of local warlords unwilling to renounce the profits it provides.
Any effective campaign would require a massive and sustained infusion of
foreign aid, coupled with strong and equally sustained political will on
the part of the new regime. There is little reason to expect either.

Regional competition

But even a successful clampdown in Afghanistan would not end the region's
role in the global drug business. This is a huge economic opportunity: the
farm gate price alone for Afghan opium is almost $300 million; the total
value of the national crop to warlords and traffickers is in excess of a
billion dollars. The majority of opium stockpiles in Afghanistan have been
shifted into northern Pakistan and, especially, the Central Asian states of
Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kazakstan. Not only are they substantial, but it
would be relatively straightforward to expand production in regions of
neighbouring countries in which state control is minimal and where drugs
are already produced. Northern Pakistan is perhaps the least congenial new
host, as although state control here is often weak, there are a tacit
series of understandings between the central government and local authority
figures, which any major expansion of drug production would break. The
Pakistan government does have formidable powers and an extensive and
relatively effective security apparatus to deploy if necessary.

Much the same is true of eastern Iran, an area increasingly favoured for
stockpiling drugs bound eventually for Europe, but in which major
cultivation is not feasible. There are even suggestions that opium is being
grown in China's unruly eastern province of Xinjiang, some reports blaming
corrupt army commanders, others Muslim radicals. However, the isolation of
the region and Beijing's determination to maintain control over it will
prevent any major expansion of drug production.

Migrating North

It is therefore far more likely that major drug production would migrate
northwards, into Central Asia. These are countries with high levels of
corruption at both central and local level, while state authority is
relatively ineffective. Economic and climatic conditions are suitable, with
large impoverished rural populations happy to adapt to crops bringing
better returns. The UN estimates that eighty percent of the population of
Tajikistan lives below the poverty line, for example, with monthly incomes
of less than $10.

In such circumstances, it is hardly surprising that the production of
marijuana, opium and ephedra - the precursor chemical for amphetamines - is
already widespread in such regions as Syrhandarya (southern Uzbekistan),
the Chu Valley (Kazakstan) and Gorny Badakhshan (Tajikistan). Besides
which, the area has already become an increasingly important transit point
for Afghan opiates, accounting for perhaps half the total outflow. Thus,
not only are the trafficking routes already in place, but so too are the
local structures to handle operations, from corrupt politicians, police and
customs officers to gangs controlling transport firms and railway stations.

The Central Asian states have not yet become major centres for producing or
processing drugs for export, but this is essentially a product of market
forces, as Afghanistan was already a cheap, secure source. The military
campaign and political settlement are very unlikely to have more than a
minor impact on this. However, even if, by some miracle of statecraft and
consensus-building, the western allies do manage to create or support a
regime able and willing to wean Afghanistan away from the drugs business,
the states of post-Soviet Central Asia appear admirably placed to be its
successors.