For 37 years Colombia has been spraying chemicals to combat illicit crops, particularly coca. These massive eradication programmes became part of the US-backed 'War on Drugs'. The fumigations are controversial for their proven inefficacy to reduce supply and demand for the use of herbicides such as glyphosate.
It is unfortunate that 35 years after the first chemical spraying in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, we are still writing about aerial sprayings in Colombia, demanding the current government to definitely defer an ecocide and incompetent policy.
Colombia's peace negotiations appear to have a rather simplistic view of drug production and trafficking that does not properly address the complex relationship between drugs and armed conflict.
Inclusion of the drug issue on the agenda of the peace talks between the Colombian government and the FARC, which are being held in Havana, Cuba, is a smart move.
