Contents:
- What is coca?
- What is its relationship to cocaine?
- Why is the coca leaf banned?
- Does the 1961 convention still ban any use of coca?
- Why should coca be removed from the UN list of prohibited drugs?
- Where is coca grown?
- How much do coca producers benefit from the drugs trade?
- What methods have been used to tackle the cocaine problem?
- Why is cocaine and drugs eradication not working?
- What other ways are there to tackle cocaine use?
- What is TNI doing on the issue of Coca?
Related primers
Human Rights and Drug Policy
Fact Sheet: Coca leaf and the UN Drugs Conventions
The UN Drug Control Conventions
1. What is coca?
Coca is a plant with a complex array of mineral nutrients, essential oils, and varied compounds with greater or lesser pharmacological effects – one of which happens to be the alkaloid cocaine, which in its concentrated, synthesized form is a stimulant with possible addictive properties.
The coca leaf has been chewed and brewed for tea traditionally for centuries among its indigenous peoples in the Andean region – and does not cause any harm and is beneficial to human health.
The traditional method of chewing coca leaf, called acullico, consists of keeping a saliva-soaked ball of coca leaves in the mouth together with an alkaline substance that assists in extracting cocaine from the leaves.
When chewed, coca acts as a mild stimulant and suppresses hunger, thirst, pain, and fatigue. It helps overcome altitude sickness. Coca chewing and drinking of coca tea is carried out daily by millions of people in the Andes without problems, and is considered sacred within indigenous cultures. Coca tea is widely used, even outside the Andean Amazon region. Coca has an established use spread among all social classes, in two Northern provinces of Argentina. There is an increasing use of coca flour as a food supplement.
Because of its stimulant effect coca leaf was originally used in the soft drink Coca Cola. In 1903 it was removed and a decocainized coca extract is one of the flavouring ingredients.
- Further reading: Coca Myths, Drugs & Conflict Debate Papers Nr. 17, June 2009
2. What is its relationship to cocaine?
While the coca leaf in its natural form is a harmless and mild stimulant comparable to coffee, there is no doubt that cocaine can be extracted from the coca leaf. Without coca there would be no cocaine. The 'ready extractability' of cocaine from coca leaves is currently the major argument to justify the current illegal status of the leaf in the 1961 Single Convention. The cocaine alkaloid content in coca leaf ranges between 0,5 and 1,0 percent.
Cocaine, was isolated about 1860 and was synthesized to be used in manufacturing popular patent medicines, beverages and "tonics" until the early years of the 20th century. Concern about cocaine use began in many countries in the 1910s and 1920s, centred on dependence on the drug and subsequent "moral ruin", particularly among the young. Laws restricting the availability of cocaine saw a drop in consumption in most of the countries surveyed from the 1920s until the 1960s.
Particularly worrying is the use of smokable cocaine base paste (PBC, paco, bazuco or crack in Latin America), as distinct from free-base and crack cocaine that is produced from cocaine in the United States and Europe. Smokable cocaine base paste is harmful and highly addictive. When sharing homemade pipes, which is often part of the crack use ritual, crack users get sores on their lips and gums and are susceptible to diseases such as herpes, tuberculosis, hepatitis and HIV/AIDS.
3. Why is the coca leaf banned?
In 1961 the coca leaf was listed on Schedule I of the UN Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs together with cocaine and heroin, with a strict control level on medical and scientific use.
The inclusion of coca leaf in Schedule I was done with a dual purpose: to phase out coca chewing and to prevent the manufacture of cocaine. The Single Convention mandated to destroy coca bush if illegally cultivated (Article 26) and that coca leaf chewing must be abolished within a 25-year period (Article 49) - i.e. by December 1989, 25 years after the coming into force of the treaty.
The rationale for including the coca leaf in the 1961 Single Convention is mainly rooted in a report by the ECOSOC Commission of Enquiry on the Coca Leaf in 1950, after a brief visit to Bolivia and Peru in 1949.
It concluded that the effects of chewing coca leaves were negative, even though it “does not at present appear that the chewing of the coca leaf can be regarded as a drug addiction in the medical sense”. The WHO expert Committee on Drug Dependence later withdrew this argument, labeling coca use as a form of cocainism.
The ECOSOC report was sharply criticised for the makeup of its researchers, its arbitrariness, poor methodology, lack of precision and racist connotations. Nowadays, a similar study would never pass the scrutiny and critical review to which scientific studies are routinely subjected.
4. Does the 1961 Convention still ban any use of coca?
In an attempt to obtain legal recognition for traditional use, Peru and Bolivia negotiated paragraph 2 of Article 14 into the 1988 Convention, stipulating that measures to eradicate illicit cultivation and illicit demand "should take due account of traditional licit use, where there is historic evidence of such use."
In 1994 the International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) – the monitoring body for the implementation of the UN international drug control conventions – mentioned that drinking of coca tea "which is considered harmless and legal in several countries in South America, is an illegal activity under the provisions of both the 1961 Convention and the 1988 Convention, though that was not the intention of the plenipotentiary conferences that adopted those conventions."
Nevertheless, in their 2007 annual report the INCB retracted on its earlier position and called on countries to "abolish or prohibit coca leaf chewing and the manufacture of coca tea."
5. Why should coca be removed from the UN list of prohibited drugs?
The inclusion of coca has caused much harm to the Andean region and a historical correction is long overdue. The 1961 Single Convention enshrined the traditional Western view, which equates coca with cocaine, and treats both in exactly the same way. A distinction needs to be made.
There should be space to find a more culturally sensitive approach to plants with psychoactive or mildly stimulant properties, and to distinguish more between problematic, recreational and traditional uses.
The provisions in the Single Convention are clearly at odds with the UN Declaration on Indigenous Rights approved in 2007, which promises to uphold and protect indigenous cultural practices.
To avoid any uncertainty that cocaine production would remain under strict control, it would be sufficient to include ‘concentrate of coca leaf’ (as a generic term for coca paste or cocaine base) in Schedule I, replacing the coca leaf.
In March 2009, the President of Bolivia, Evo Morales, sent a letter sent a letter to the Secretary General of the United Nations, Ban Ki Moon, requesting the suspension of the paragraphs 1c and 2e of Article 49 of 1961 UN Single Convention that prohibit the chewing of coca leaf. He also announced that he would start the process to remove the coca leaf from the 1961 Single Convention.
On July 30, 2009, the Bolivian proposal to amend the 1961 Single Convention by deleting the obligation to abolish the chewing of coca leaf was on the ECOSOC agenda (UN Social and Economic Council). Parties have 18 months to express objections or comments on the Bolivian request, until January 31, 2011.
From Bolivia’s point of view, the international community holds in its hands a historic opportunity to correct a misconception regarding coca leaf chewing by eliminating both paragraphs of the Single Convention. This action will restore the dignity and lawful right to the people that consume coca leaf for traditional and medicinal purposes to legally exercise this cultural and harmless practice.
The final count after closure of the January 31 deadline to file objections to the Bolivian amendment came to 17 objections: the US, UK, Sweden, Canada, Denmark, Germany, the Russian Federation, Japan, Singapore, Slovakia, Estonia, France, Italy, Bulgaria, Latvia, Malaysia and Mexico. That means that only 17 of the 184 countries that are Party to the treaty (as amended by the 1972 Protocol) have filed an objection. We call on them to still reconsider and withdraw their objection before the issue appears on the UN agenda for a decision.
6. Where is coca grown?
Coca is traditionally cultivated in the lower altitudes of the eastern slopes of the Andes, or the highlands depending on the species grown, in particular in Bolivia, Colombia and Peru.