BOLIVIA for the first time in seven years has reduced the area under cultivation with coca crops, the raw material for cocaine, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime said yesterday.

The South American nation went from having 30,500ha of coca crops in 2021 to 29,900ha last year, the UN office said.

“There was a reduction of 2% from 2021 to 2022,” it said in an annual report.

The data, gathered from satellite images, showed a decline in the crops after seven years of steady growth.

Bolivia allows the cultivation and marketing of coca leaves for chewing, use in tea and for religious rituals. Authorities cap cultivation at 22,200ha to provide for the licit market.

But some of the production is siphoned off for illicit cocaine production. Bolivia is the third-largest producer of cocaine after Peru and Colombia, the UN office said.

Most of Bolivia’s coca cultivation centres on the subtropical Yungas region near the capital La Paz and in areas near Cochabamba in the middle of the country.

Since the 1980s, Bolivian authorities have sought to eradicate coca by deploying combined forces of police and military units in drug-growing areas. – AFP, November 1, 2023.