Afghanistan’s opium production is through the roof—why Washington shouldn’t overreact - Brookings

In 2017, opium cultivation in Afghanistan reached a record high, with multifaceted impacts on the country. Yet Afghan heroin is not fueling the deadly U.S. opiate epidemic to any significant degree. And there is very little the United States or other countries can do about the opiate production in Afghanistan. Given the precarious security situation there and the intensification of violent conflict, most policy tools are either ineffective or highly counterproductive. Solutions to the global problem of drug addiction lie within consumer countries themselves.

From 2016 to 2017, the area under opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan increased by 63 percent, to 328,000 hectares (ha); the estimated total production of opium shot up by 87 percent to 9,000 metric tons (mt). That’s the most in Afghan history. Most of the expansion of took place in Helmand province, long the hub of Afghan opium production as well as Taliban insurgency. With 144,000 ha cultivated with poppy, that province alone surpasses production levels in all of Myanmar, the world’s second largest producer of opiates. But cultivation expanded throughout the country, including in the north, such as in Balkh and Jawzjan. - Read More

Afghanistan’s opium production is through the roof—why Washington shouldn’t overreact