File talk:HeroinWorld-en.svg

Wrong Information on Map
The Map indicating "Main producers of opium for the heroin trade" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:HeroinWorld-en.svg) is extremely misleading. Iran produces no illegal opium or heroin. Not only is opium production in Iran totally banned, illegal, but also carries a penalty of death by lethal injection or strangulation. Like all other countries Iran has a limited number of globally recognized opium fields for research, medicine and the pharmaceutical industry, and despite the outrageous claim from the map, the number of the legal opium fields in Iran is LESS than the number of legal opium poppy fields in France or Spain, let alone claiming heroin production. According to U.N. statistics, Iran has no role, and no contribution to the worlds illegal heroin production. Iran's contribution to the worlds illicit opium production for 2008 was... guess...... 0... 2007.... again 0.... 2006 again 0... and so on (www.un.org & www.unodc.org). The map maker is obviously not a professional in the subject, or is a professional but has a bias or a defamatory intention when it comes to Iran, and to some extent Pakistan. However, even though opium production in Iran is none existent, Afghan opium and heroin is illegally trafficked through Russia, Iran, India and Pakistan, via lorries, air, cross-mountain camel bandits, and tunnels. Iran's border patrol confiscates more Afghan heroin and opium annually than any other country in the world, however, the trafficking through Iran is less than what is trafficked through Russia both from Afghanistan, meaning Russia is a bigger conveyor belt for Afghan Heroin than Iran or Pakistan. Never the less, Trafficking and production are 2 separate topics and factors, rendering the map inaccurate, misleading, and defamatory to Persians who are not just struggling to stop Afghan heroin trafficking from reaching Europe and other parts of West Asia but are also victims of the influx of cheap Afghan heroin/opium itself, let alone being mislabeled as producers and accomplices to the global Heroin production. Pakistan though does produce opium for illicit use, but the numbers are very insignificant to even bear mentioning. Iran alongside Russia, and Turkey is only a frequent route for Heroin trafficking, but has no contribution to illicit Heroin or Opium production. I will remove the map until the creator fixes this problem. Please do not upload/create maps before running them through the discussion group first. Things like this results in misinformation to many, and possibly students who then print out the map thinking it is reliable information. --93.97.181.187 (talk) 04:31, 17 February 2009 (UTC)

Illegal production


Opium production has fallen greatly since 1906, when 41,000 tons were produced, but because 39,000 tons of that year's opium were consumed in China, overall usage in the rest of the world was much lower. In 1980, 2,000 tons of opium supplied all legal and illegal uses. Recently, opium production has increased considerably, surpassing 5,000 tons in 2002. In 2002, the price for one kilogram of opium was $300 for the farmer, $800 for purchasers in Afghanistan, and $16,000 on the streets of Europe before conversion into heroin.

Following documented trends of increasing availability mirroring increased American military and geo-political regional involvement, Afghanistan is currently the primary producer of the drug. After regularly producing 70% of the world's opium, Afghanistan decreased production to 74 tons per year under a ban by the Taliban in 2000, a move which cut production by 94 per cent. A year later, after American and British troops invaded Afghanistan, removed the Taliban and installed the interim government, the land under cultivation leapt back to 285 square miles, with Afghanistan supplanting Burma to become the world's largest opium producer once more. Opium production in that country has increased rapidly since, reaching an all-time high in 2006. According to DEA statistics, Afghanistan's production of oven-dried opium increased to 1,278 tons in 2002, more than doubled by 2003, and nearly doubled again during 2004. In late 2004, the U.S. government estimated that 206,000 hectares were under poppy cultivation, 4.5% of the country's total cropland, and produced 4,200 metric tons of opium, 76% of the world's supply, yielding 60% of Afghanistan's gross domestic product. In 2006, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime estimated production to have risen 59% to 407000 acre in cultivation, yielding 6,100 tons of opium, 82% of the world's supply. The value of the resulting heroin was estimated at $3.5 billion, of which Afghan farmers were estimated to have received $700 million in revenue (of which the Taliban have been estimated to have collected anywhere from tens of millions to $140 million in taxes). For farmers, the crop can be up to ten times more profitable than wheat.

An increasingly large fraction of opium is processed into morphine base and heroin in drug labs in Afghanistan. Despite an international set of chemical controls designed to restrict availability of acetic anhydride, it enters the country, perhaps through its Central Asian neighbors which do not participate. A counternarcotics law passed in December 2005 requires Afghanistan to develop registries or regulations for tracking, storing, and owning acetic anhydride.

Besides Afghanistan, smaller quantities of opium are produced in Pakistan, the Golden Triangle region of Southeast Asia (particularly Myanmar), Colombia and Mexico.

Label "Laos" seems to point to Thailand
Subject says it all, I think. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:44C8:45CF:CB18:410F:6CBD:5F96:3833 (talk) 06:14, 19 May 2020 (UTC)