Pubdate: Sun,  5 Sep 2010
Source: San Jose Mercury News (CA)
Copyright: 2010 San Jose Mercury News
Contact:  http://www.mercurynews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/390
Author: Tim Johnson, McClatchy Newspapers
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/topic/Mexico
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?261 (Cannabis - United States)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)

FOR MEXICAN CARTELS, MARIJUANA IS STILL GOLD

CORRE COYOTE, Mexico -- Times are good for the dope growers of the 
western Sierra Madre. The army eradication squads that once hacked at 
the illicit marijuana fields have been diverted by the drug war 
that's raging elsewhere in Mexico.

The military's retreat has delighted farmers who are sowing and 
reaping marijuana. Cultivation in Mexico soared 35 percent last year 
and is now higher than at any time in nearly two decades, the State 
Department says.

It's also been a boon for Mexico's powerful organized-crime groups.

Marijuana is perishable, bulky and less profitable than their other 
exports -- heroin, cocaine and crystal meth -- but drug-trafficking 
experts say that every major trafficking organization in Mexico reaps 
significant income from marijuana, drawing on cross-border criminal 
networks that carry cannabis to scores of U.S. cities.

"They tend to be a cash cow for the drug-trafficking organizations," 
David Johnson, the assistant secretary of state for international 
narcotics and law enforcement affairs, said during a visit to Mexico last week.

An aerial tour deep into the Sierra Madres at the side of a Mexican 
army general and a small army eradication unit -- one of a handful 
that are still actively working -- shows marijuana crops flourishing 
in valley after valley of the rugged, pine-covered region. The 
mountain slopes and valleys in the part of southern Chihuahua state 
that's hugged by Sinaloa and Durango states are sometimes called 
Mexico's Golden Triangle -- after the opium-producing Golden Triangle 
of Southeast Asia -- because of their productivity. Illicit crops 
include not only marijuana but also poppy, the flowering plant that 
provides the white gummy latex that's later processed into opium and heroin.

It's a dangerous area. Even the poorest farmers tote weapons. A third 
of the region's population is thought to earn its living from the 
illicit drug industry.

Peasant farms need little to grow small fields of marijuana: bags of 
seeds, some fertilizer, lengths of hose for primitive irrigation 
systems and a few months for the crop to mature into 10-foot-tall plants.

According to State Department estimates, the areas of harvestable 
marijuana fields in Mexico grew from 10,130 acres in 2001 to 29,652 
acres in 2009. During the same period, the area of eradication dropped by half.

Farmers see little stigma -- or risk -- in growing cannabis.

"It's always been said that poppy is controlled by organized crime, 
and marijuana is for the people. Growing it is like growing corn," 
said the general.

The biggest competition for Mexican cartels comes from domestic 
marijuana growers in the United States. A document produced by local, 
state and federal law enforcement officials in California's Central 
Valley says that California's 2009 marijuana harvest alone surpassed 
the annual estimated harvest of nearly 32,000 tons in Mexico. It put 
overall U.S. marijuana production at 76,380 tons.

"Mexicans sometimes tell me that they think we are self-sufficient in 
marijuana," Johnson said.
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