The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) released its annual drug report, highlighting the manifold destruction caused by a surging cocaine industry.

The World Drug Report 2024, published June 26, takes a look at global data over recent years to analyze the trends around illicit substances. It focuses on broader global trends, especially concerning the cultivation of crops and the production of synthetic drugs, while also examining the impact the illicit drug industry has on society and institutions.

“The drug problem is expanding both from the use side and from the supply side. There is more production, more trafficking, and also complexity, so more substances,” Angela Me, the UNODC’s head of research, told InSight Crime.

SEE ALSO: South America’s Cocaine Supply Boom Shows Up in European Wastewater Analysis

The report details the rise of cocaine production and its devastating effects on populations and the environment. Drug-related destruction is a global phenomenon, and in Latin America, it is often the young that are most affected.

Drug trafficking continues to expand globally, while consumption of drugs is rising. While opium production is falling, other drugs may be taking its place, as organized crime groups continue to explore novel illicit industries. 

Here, InSight Crime breaks down the most important findings for Latin American organized crime.

Cocaine Production Wreaks Violence and Environmental Destruction

Drug trafficking groups have violently expanded amid historic levels of cocaine production, wreaking ecological havoc and expanding into other criminal economies.

Production of cocaine and the growing of coca bush have been steadily rising for decades, but 2022 saw a dramatic uptick. The report estimates that 2,757 tons of cocaine were produced globally in 2022, a 20% increase from the year before, and three times as much as was made nearly a decade ago. These volumes of cocaine were propelled by 355,000 hectares of coca bush cultivated in 2022, up 21% in one year.

Booming cocaine production has led to a rise in violence and displacements in Colombia, the world’s number one cocaine exporter. The country’s Pacific region has been particularly affected as armed groups wage war over drug trafficking.

But no country has suffered the impact of the cocaine boom as much as Ecuador. There, local gangs have been turbocharged by the inflow of cocaine and now work with Colombian, Mexican, and Balkan organizations to move the drug along Ecuador’s waterways and to its international ports. As conflict over the routes has worsened, homicides have soared, politicians and political candidates have been assassinated, and the country has fallen into a near-permanent state of emergency. 

In the Caribbean, where island nations are used as a stopping point to move cocaine to North America and Europe, local gangs have unleashed fighting to establish and defend their territory, and homicides have risen.

As cocaine has traveled across oceans, killings have followed. 

“Startling levels of violence associated with cocaine trafficking and competition between criminal groups and gangs are affecting Latin America and the Caribbean, as well as countries in Western Europe,” the report stated.

Routes between South America and Europe have become well established, with Ecuador, the Southern Cone, and Brazil being the major exit hubs. The North Sea has become the primary entry point, the report found. 

The rise in cocaine production is also fuelling the destruction of the environment. In Bolivia, traffickers continue to expand, moving into the Amazon, and contributing to deforestation. And on the Peru-Colombia-Brazil border, increased coca cultivation has spurred illegal deforestation, timber trafficking, and illegal gold mining.

“There are three border areas [in South America] that have been captured by organized crime. And it’s not only drugs. The issue is that they enter with drugs and then they start environmental crime,” said Me.

Drug Trade Hits Latin American Youth

Consumption of drugs is increasingly affecting youth in Latin America, the report found.

Central America and the Caribbean is the region with the highest proportion of under 18s seeking treatment for drug addiction, with South American a close second.

“Drug use disorders at a young age are particularly concerning because they can lead to a vicious circle involving lower educational attainment and impaired chances of social reintegration,” the report said.

Organized crime groups can use drugs to create a cycle, selling drugs to make money, and recruiting those that become addicted, according to the report. 

“We cannot think about the drug problem without thinking about organized crime more holistically,” Me explained. “The cycle is not just about drugs – it’s about organized crime.”

Drug addiction in the region has been exploited by organized crime groups. In Mexico, addiction to synthetic drugs, like methamphetamine, is on the rise, hitting the country’s youth particularly hard. Organized crime groups have recruited from rehabilitation centers, exploiting the state’s incapacity to turn patients into lookouts, dealers, and killers.

Opium Falls but Synthetics Are on the Rise

A ban on opium in Afghanistan has forced traffickers to dip into stockpiles to move heroin, but new synthetic opiates are emerging. 

The cultivation of opium, the base ingredient for heroin, has plummeted by 95% in Afghanistan, the world’s major opium supplier, following an April 2022 ban by the Taliban. Opium production dropped 70% around the world between 2022 and 2023. Previous reports by the UNODC estimated that Afghanistan produced up to 88% of the world’s opium. 

Though production is down, opium seizures remain steady, indicating that traffickers are dipping into stockpiles to make up for the decrease. If heroin supply dries up, synthetic drugs may fill the demand in the world’s major markets, including the United States and Europe.

SEE ALSO: How Precursor Chemicals Sustain Mexico’s Synthetic Drug Trade

“The production of synthetic opioids can be cheaper, faster, and more profitable than heroin and can open up opportunities to new groups without links to the Balkan route or lead old groups to diversify and modify their supply chains,” said the report. 

Synthetic opioids have decimated North America, with the hyper-potent drug, fentanyl, largely replacing heroin. A new, even stronger group of synthetic opiates, nitazenes, are also showing up around the world, according to the UNODC. 

Methamphetamine is also on the rise, with traffickers potentially shifting to new drugs to replace their profits from heroin. In February, Andrew Cunningham of the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) told InSight Crime that methamphetamine and other synthetic cathinone stimulants could be replacements for heroin among Europe’s users should the supply of the drug run dry.

Feature image: The headquarters of the UNODC in Vienna, Austria. Credit: UNODC