Marijuana Farmers in Mexico Make Switch to Heroin as Cannabis Prices Fall Shawn Raymundo - Latin Times
go to original April 7, 2014

A Mexican drug enforcement agent shows how a poppy is cut to extract the sap used to make opium and heroin in a field in the southern state of Guerrero, Mexico. (Matias Recart/AFP)

As marijuana prices have plummeted in the last five years, in part because of decriminalization in some states of the U.S., Mexican drug farmers in the remote valleys of the northern Sierra Madre have began to harvest opium poppies instead and distribute cheap $4 heroin to many rural areas in America.

The Washington Post reported that U.S. law enforcement agencies have been cracking down on prescription painkiller abuse including hydrocodone and OxyContin, which have created a new market for Mexican trafficking organizations to sell heroin.

The flow of the heroin into cities such as Winchester, Va. and Brattleboro, Vt. have been traced to the "Golden Triangle" region in the Mexico's Sinaloa state. Sinaloa is known for its infamous drug cartels and production of the biggest marijuana harvest.

However, farmers don't want to sell marijuana anymore because of the steep decline in wholesale price, which has dropped from $100 per kilogram to less than $25, lifelong cannabis farmer Rodrigo Silla told the Post.

"It's not worth it anymore," Silla said. "I wish the American would stop with the legalization."

Read the rest at Latin Times

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