south-asian-militant-groups-and-global-jihad-in-2015

NEW AG EN T S OF GLOB AL JIHAD
destroying opium poppy crops were not heeded, and when such
threats were carried out, they were followed by a spike in local
Taliban units, as locals flooded to join the insurgency.
Controversially, British forces in Helmand were eventually forced
to back down and tacitly allow poppy growing, even sending some
forces to attend demonstrations of how to process the crop as a
goodwill gesture. 118,119
Hopes of quasi-legalizing the crop to produce medical supplies
such as morphine and codeine have been put forward. 120 As
appealing as this idea is, given the shortage of powerful painkillers
in hospitals across the developing world, the unfortunate truth is
that neither the opium poppy nor morphine in Afghanistan are
particularly competitive. Strict regulations and security that guard
legal opium crops, coupled with the fact that morphine is not
patented and so cannot be sold very expensively, make for an
uncompetitive drug. Afghanistan does not have the agricultural
advantages in the way of machinery and manpower that legal
producers such as Australia has. Furthermore, it cannot compete
in terms of commercial production costs, and at present, there are
several obstacles that stand in the way of making this crop a
valuable way of helping its producers rise out of poverty. 121
Despite lack of commercial incentive to legally harvest Afghan
opium poppy, there is still demand for its presence in global
medical markets. Therefore, we suggest a non-profit initiative to
harvest Afghan opium at prices that are beneficial to Afghan
producers, and to redistribute its medical products to hospitals in
need; this way, potential for both conflict appeasement and
palliative care will be fulfilled. Failing that, the temptation to
engage in coercive narcotics restriction must be resisted in favor
of a long-term strategy to make the opium trade less desirable by
diversifying the Afghan rural economy.
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