Successful development programmes in drug-producing regions

Successful development programmes in drug-producing regions - longer version

There have not been any significant successful alternative development projects resulting from Plan Colombia, due in part to under-funding and poor management. However, in the Middle Magdalena region of northern Colombia, which encompasses 29 municipalities along the middle section of the Magdalena River, the Middle Magdalena Program for Peace and Development has provided alternatives to coca growers even though it has not been specifically designed as a counter-narcotics programme. It operates 340 projects involving 30,000 people throughout the region. These projects include African palm and cacao growing co-operatives, school programs, aqueduct systems, productivity improvement, housing, and community workshops. All the projects emphasize local control in order to strengthen communities and to help them develop economically, socially and politically.

In many of the rural regions under its control, the FARC is requiring peasants who choose to cultivate coca to devote at least thirty percent of their land area to alternative crops, particularly subsistence food crops. The objective is to allow farmers to earn additional income through coca cultivation in order to help alleviate their poverty while preventing them from abandoning traditional crops entirely and becoming completely dependent on the illicit drug trade.