How Fentanyl Changed the Game for Mexico’s Drug Cartels Christine Murray - Financial Times
go to original July 28, 2023

Inside the fentanyl cartel: Mexico crime lords feeding US addiction (Channel 4 News)

In the last decade, fentanyl has become the leading cause of death for young adults in the US. Mexico’s illegal drug trade has also adapted to the shift from plant-based drugs towards synthetics, creating a new, streamlined and highly profitable arm of the illicit business with fewer workers and lower costs — but just as much violence.

The change has caused friction in two of Washington’s most important relationships, with China and Mexico. It is also fast becoming a priority for US Republicans ahead of the country’s 2024 presidential election, with candidates rolling out ever more radical proposals for measures against both nations.

Stopping the supply is not easy.

In Manzanillo, cranes lift newly arrived containers filled with everything from clothes and powdered milk to car parts. On the dusty back roads, trucks carrying rolled steel await deployment and men in high-vis jackets zip around on motorbikes carrying essential paperwork.

The port handles 9,500 20-foot equivalent units a day, including some 30 per cent of the country’s maritime imports. Even without threats and corruption, Mexico’s customs — now under the control of the navy — would struggle to find the tiny amounts of input chemicals needed to make fentanyl among this vast load, experts said. Adding to the complexity, many of the ingredients can also be used for legal purposes, as can the highly potent fentanyl itself.

All the fentanyl needed to supply the US for one year weighs the equivalent of 5 tonnes and would easily fit into one lorry, according to researchers at Rand Corporation. That compares with about 125 tonnes for heroin and even more for cocaine.

“It’s not a needle in a haystack, it’s the hole in the needle in the haystack,” said Peter Reuter, public policy professor at the University of Maryland.

Read the rest at Financial Times

Related: AMLO Disputes DEA Claims About Mexican Cartels’ Worldwide Reach (Mexico News Daily)

Related: Mexican Marines Seize 7,200 Bottles of Liquid Meth in Mezcal Bottles Bound for Australia (Associated Press)

Related: Mexico Hosts Meeting of Trilateral Fentanyl Committee (Mexico News Daily)

Related: Mexico Announces Plan With Us to Boost Firearm Tracing (Reuters)

Related: DEA Said It Seized Enough Fentanyl to Kill Us All. The Claim Adds Up (Washington Post)

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