Alternative Development and Eradication

Drugs & Conflict Debate Paper 4, March 2002

In the area of failed alternative development (AD) projects, the Andean region has its sorry share to contribute. The constant peasant uprisings n the Bolivian Chapare and the social tensions rife among cocalero peasants in the South of Colombia are woeful indicators of such failure.

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Martin Jelsma, keynote speech International Conference on The Role of Alternative Development in Drug Control and Development Cooperation, Feldafing, Germany, 8 January 2002

What can Alternative Development interventions realistically hope to achieve, given the growing demand for illicit drugs and the continuing prevalence of rural poverty.

Statement of the Transnational Institute

Commission on Narcotic Drugs 52nd Session, High-level Segment
Round Table D - 12 March 2009, 2.30-5.30 pm
Countering illicit drug traffic and supply, and alternative development.

In his statement Martin Jelsma of TNI expressed the disappointment with the agreed texts on alternative development in the Political Declaration and Plan of Action at the Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) dedicated to the 1998 UNGASS review. No consensus could be reached on the issue of drug control conditionality in development assistance, despite the outcomes of expert evaluations that recommended to "not make development assistance conditional on reductions in illicit drug crop cultivation”, and to "ensure that eradication is not undertaken until small-farmer households have adopted viable and sustainable livelihoods and that interventions are properly sequenced."

He further referred to the outcomes of the first World Forum of farmers of coca, cannabis and opium poppy from Latin America, Africa and Asia.

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Alternative Development programmes, aimed at encouraging peasants to switch from growing illicit drugs-related crops, play an important role in UN drug control strategies. The record of success, however, is a questionable one. Decades of efforts to reduce global drug supply using a combination of developmental and repressive means, managed to shift production from one country to another, but have failed in terms of global impact.

An introduction for the 2003 UNGASS mid-term review, March 2003 

Wednesday 18 February 2009

The Transnational Institute (TNI) and the German Technical Cooperation (GTZ) co-hosted the First Southeast Asian Informal Drug Policy Dialogue, 12-14 February 2009 in Bangkok. The dialogue – similar to TNI efforts in Europe and Latin America – brought together government officials, experts, NGOs and representatives of international agencies, to discuss dilemmas and possible improvements in drug policy making in the region. Participants in the Bangkok meeting were from Burma, Thailand, Laos, Yunnan (China) and Northeast India.