Kabul, Feb 10 (DPA) Afghanistan this year is likely to produce less opium, the raw material for heroin and a major source of revenue for its Taliban-led insurgency, as yields decrease, a UN survey released Wednesday found.
Although an assessment conducted by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) predicted a production drop, it also said the area of land under poppy cultivation would be stable in 2010 at 123,000 hectares, the same amount as last year.
“Bad weather during the current growing season may reduce the productivity of the crop this year and thus volume of opium produced in the country,” the survey found. “This would continue the decline that has seen production fall from a massive 8,200 tonnes in 2007 to 6,900 tonnes last year.”
The expected production decline follows bumper yields for Afghan opium farmers of 56 kg per hectare in 2009, compared with 10 kg per hectare in the Golden Triangle area of Myanmar, Laos and Thailand, the UN said.
The epicentre for Afghan poppy cultivation is in the south, where Taliban insurgents are most active.
The UN survey found that 61 percent of farmers in areas where government authority is established said that they did not grow poppy plants because it was banned, compared with 39 percent of farmers citing the same reasons in regions where the government is less present.
