With 4 million users, cocaine alone is the second most popular illegal drug in the United States. Its raw material is the coca plant, which turns into a paste that forms the basis of the drug’s well-known white powder form.
The coca plant grows more than 4,000 miles away in South American countries such as Peru and Colombia. Most notably, Peru’s Vrae Valley is now considered the coca capital of the world, producing more than 47,000 tons of cocaine a year, more than Colombia.
About 92 percent of Vrae’s population lives below the poverty line, and more than 18,000 farmers grow coca, which is 20 times more profitable than a common crop. Growing coca is illegal, and they harvest the leaves and make coca paste as quickly as possible to avoid being caught by the government’s military anti-narcotics police. Raw cocoa leaves cost $3 a kilo, but prices for paste jumped to $900 a kilo. Of course, farmers can only make money if they don’t get caught.
Once the paste is ready, couriers (some as young as 12) must deliver it to cocaine powder producers more than 120 miles away. Transport is done on foot to avoid thieves and police checks. It’s been a harrowing two-day trek through the bush, and when it’s done, the cocaine is now worth $1,300 a kilo.
The manufacturer is responsible for turning the paste into a powder. Meanwhile, smugglers are using small planes to fly it out of the country from a small airport in Peru’s Pitches Palcazu region. Travel to Central America, where cocaine is now worth $10,000 a kilo.
A vast network of local and international police is relentlessly hunting down Coke. Police are burning farms, grain and paste laboratories and even blowing up airport runways in an effort to stem the flow of more than 120 tons of cocaine out of the country every day. In the air, U.S. Customs and Border Protection took over the hunt for human traffickers using the high-tech P3 surveillance plane, which is capable of tracking drug-trafficking planes over a wide area.
However, flying weather conditions and international airspace regulations can sometimes be an obstacle. Many of the drug planes still fled to Guatemala, while the cocaine was bound for Tijuana, Mexico, and San Diego, California. The Siniloan drug cartel has even dug more than 160 extremely unstable and dangerous tunnels to allow drugs to cross the border without being detected. At this point, cocaine is now worth $28,000 per kilogram.
The cartel bosses then take over and sell it to retailers for $80,000 per kilo and distribute it to end users in clubs, parties, etc. for $40 per 1/2 gram sachet. Cocaine end users are often at risk of becoming addicted to the drug, even though it can lead to heart attacks, kidney failure, brain damage and death. However, they don’t seem to care.
“Cocaine Journey” has all the makings of a true Hollywood blockbuster. It brings violence, addiction, death and destruction that many people ignore and sniff for the high (both physical and financial) they get.
Directed by: Stefania Buonajuti
