RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Even in times of pandemic, President Iván Duque makes no exceptions in the fight against coca growing by small producers.
Despite the nationwide curfew enforced by Duque on March 24th as a protective and preventive measure against the spread of the coronavirus, massive military operations to eradicate coca plantations have been underway for about a month.
These include the departments of Antioquia and Chocó, Norte de Santander, Nariño, Putumayo, and Caquetá. There, military personnel and operatives have been flown into the remote and therefore difficult to access areas, sometimes by helicopter, to extract and destroy (using glyphosate) these plants. In areas where local residents, local farmers’ organizations, and coca farmers say that not even the coronavirus aid packages are currently reaching.
The news website ‘Prensarural’ describes the President’s harsh action against the small farmers as a “ticking time bomb”.
Violent clashes are currently taking place between farmers and the military, in which the soldiers not only use gas and rubber bullets against the protesters but also use bladed weapons. At least two people have died and dozens have been injured.
The reason behind the government’s action could be the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime’s report, released earlier this year, and statements by the US DEA, according to which approximately 90 percent of the cocaine sold in the US in 2019 (around 951 tons) was produced in Colombia.
Yule Anzueta, a member of parliament in the Putumayo department, states that the government itself is to blame for the growth of coca production. The failure to comply with the “National Program for the Substitution of Illegally Used Crops “, and its extinction, which was agreed under point 4 of the peace treaty, has led to a renewed increase in coca cultivation in the region.
With the signing of the peace treaty between the Farc-EP guerrillas and the government, 99,097 coca farmers nationwide had voluntarily committed themselves to renounce coca growing, says Hermenides Moncada, mayor of Sardinata (Norte de Santander).
The government’s contribution provides for an immediate measure, in which a farmer’s family receives a year’s financial support of €300 per month as compensation. In addition, short and long-term food security and income generation projects are to be funded.
In addition, the “Integrated Plans for Substitution and Alternative Development” should result in social investments for a sustainable and subsequent development in the coca-growing areas.
The fact that tens of thousands of farmer families, who had either applied or wanted to join the program at a later stage but were excluded, has been criticized. In addition, the committed investments to reduce structural disadvantages failed to materialize.
The families assisted by the emergency action plan and, in particular, the project support funding payments are also said to have failed to materialize in many cases. In addition, such payments to the families have now been discontinued.
Those affected are concerned that unless an agreement is reached and alternative measures are offered, the uprooting operations will not be successful in the end, as the coca plantations will soon be replanted.
Víctor Darío Luna, a member of the municipal council in Nóvita (Chocó), a community that has been targeted by the government offensive since April 20th, stresses that the farmers have no other choice but to secure their livelihoods through the income from the sale of coca leaves.
However, President Duque has made it clear that he will not comply with the demand of the affected coca farmers for a suspension of the operation during the pandemic.
The Ministry of Defense says that it cannot be ruled out, however, that the security forces are not at risk of coronavirus infection during these operations, considering that about four weeks ago hundreds of people (Farc dissidents, police and military) allegedly invaded the country’s fifth-largest coca-growing region near Sardinata.
In the peripheral areas with poor or non-existent health care, the impact of a spread of the coronavirus would be catastrophic.
The coca farmers, for their part, say that without coca or without financial support from the state, they do not know how to buy food, hygiene, and health products and how they will be able to survive.
As a result of their livelihood concerns and in order not to lose their source of income, they will, therefore, protest and strike at all costs against the destruction of their coca plantations.
The three-day blockade of the important coal route near Sardinata in late March by approximately 800 farmers, and the current blockades near Tumaco, may thus only be the beginning of an imminent mass mobilization.