The Business Of The Drug Cartels In Colombia And Its Impact

Introduction

The United States has been trying to combat the problem of illicit drugs for a long time. Various states are supplying and trafficking different kinds of drugs. In Colombia, the war between the government and narcotics traffickers is going on against the practices of distributing and the production of illicit drugs. Drug-related criminal organizations like Medellin Cartel frequently cooperate with other guerrilla groups for the protection of illegal drugs. The production, distribution and expansion of narcotics from Colombia are negatively influencing the regional partners that are associated with its geostrategic and geopolitical location. It also impacts on the distortions of Colombian markets, vanishing social and human capital, and significant loss to the government and people of Colombia.

Description

Located in South America, Colombia is the centre of the illicit drug trade. It produces around eighty per cent of the cocaine that supplies to the different states of the world. The country of Colombia is bordered by Ecuador, Peru, Panama, and Venezuela. The state of Brazil is also linked with Colombia. Both the Pacific and the Caribbean oceans are accessible and attached to Colombia. The geostrategic and geopolitical location of the country opened the way for drug traffickers in 1970. The state was an excellent transhipment location for drug suppliers and firms. The organizations move their cocaine by using the air, land and sea routes of the country.

Colombia has the fifth largest economy in Latin America. It became the internationalized production sector with speedy growth. The states are enjoying a successful democratic setup. However, after 1990, the image of the state changed with the label of drug trafficking and criminal state. The bad reputation of Colombia was because of the excess supply of illegal drugs. People and the government became impaired due to the weak economy and the control of the government in curbing the menace of drug cartels. It led to increasing corruption and violence in the allocation of funds to the public. The rates of homicides with the production of drugs have also destroyed the lives of the ordinary Colombian population.

After many years, the drug traffickers of the Colombian state have had the advantage of the favourable climate that allows them to produce more and more drugs. The firms and the groups have created large-scale coca through local cultivation (Arias, 2017). The efforts from the US to eliminate the drugs failed in Peru and Bolivia, which provided the central role to Colombia in producing and cultivating the coca. The country is building twice cocaine in contrast with its competitors. The majority of the Colombian cocaine is growing in the south-western and the Amazon basin region. The producer of the cocaine was pushed by the American aerial fumigation towards the north and the eastern part. The planting was picked in the northern areas like Arauca and the Antioquia.

The industry of cocaine is established through the production, trafficking and cultivation of cocaine. It remains one of the significant business industries. There are around three million people associated with the business, generating three billion dollars in revenue for the country (Arias, 2017). The revenue is estimated to be three per cent of Colombia’s overall GDP. However, the nature and function of the illicit drug business have changed in recent years. The two firms that are associated with the business industry of drugs are Medellin and the Cali cartels, which are influencing the lives of people. Both have complete control over the business of cocaine and illicit drugs in the international market. The death of Pablo Escobar in the year of 1993, along with the arrest of Rodrigues’s brother, led to the collapse of the cartels. The drug trafficking business owner has adopted new conditions for the promotion of their business.

The stakeholders involved in the drug business disintegrated and formed alliances with the small decentralized group. The independent operators have taken over the responsibility of the risk of spreading and expanding the activity of the drugs in different regions. The armed groups in the different parts of Colombia became involved in the trade of drugs along with the decentralized groups. Their strategy includes exacting taxes on shipments that move from their territories (Bedoya, 2017). They also hired individuals from outside of the cartel for the protection of smugglers and became directly involved in the trafficking of drugs.

Currently, the group that are serving for the control and trafficking of drugs are dispersed in the small cells. By employing a variety of methods, they smuggle cocaine to the United States. The land routes are used for the trade through Mexico to reach the US markets. The traffickers in Colombia also use the sea routes through the Caribbean to move drugs to the European and eastern coastal regions. There are around four per cent of people that consume cocaine in their life. Among those, half of the drugs came from Colombia. In recent years, around seventeen million people have used illicit drugs. The pure cocaine was around eight hundred tons. Similarly, the value of the illegal drug used by people last year was twenty billion dollars.

The states that are included in the growing consumption and demand of cocaine are Europe, South America, the United States, and Brazil. Colombia is one of the biggest suppliers of cocaine to the multiple states of the world. Peru and Bolivia come next in the line of suppliers (Bergman, 2018). These countries have frequent consumption of coca, a substance used for cocaine. In Colombia, coca is grown in those parts of the states where state authorities have a lack of control. The land in the Colombian countries is available for any illegal activity. The farmers have a 2 lac hectares area for the production of cocaine.

The calculations of the United Nations reveal that in 2016, one million families in Colombian state live off the coca. By selling the coca, families have an income of twelve hundred dollars in a month. The revenue depends on the region and the rate of the particular buyer.  In the United States, cocaine gets into the streets and drastically impacts the life of the average man. In the same way, one-kilo cocaine will generate revenue of sixty thousand for the individual having the business of cocaine. The authorities are trying to combat the disease of illicit drugs. In the last year, Colombia has the production of cocaine up to nine hundred tons.

The defence ministry of Colombia revealed that it destroyed fifty thousand hectares in 2016. However, authorities have the view that in the coming years, it will be increased. The Colombian state lacks a program for the effective substitution of large crops, as its farmers consistently cultivate plants despite the fact that the current harvest is being destroyed by the authorities (Caicedo, 2015). Converting of the coca leaves into the coca is primarily done by the farmers, the drug traffickers have the lesser role in exercising the practice of conversion. 125-kilo leaves are required for the making of one-kilo cocaine. The local drug trafficking clans have control over the drug labs that are run by the farmers. It includes the international organizations, units of guerrillas and those that traffic cocaine to the southern cone, Europe, and the US.

A meagre amount of the cocaine is supplied through the airports. Most of the trafficking was done by using the routes of Colombian two coastlines and the border of the state. Trucks and cars are used for transportation through land, while boats are frequently used for sea routes. The rivers and the dense jungles provide corridors for unhindered trafficking. By intimidating the locals and bribing the officials, the traffickers clear the roads and the shipment, which otherwise might be exposed. The drugs, when they reach the Caribbean and the Pacific coastlines of Colombia, are loaded onto the ships for transportation to the hubs in the Caribbean and Central America.

The groups like the Mexican Sinaloa Cartel supervise the sailing of the drugs to the United States and other regions (Ceron, 2018). In other cases, like the port cities, the crime gangs, in collaboration with the port authorities, load drugs in the containers. They also have the links and cooperation of international trafficking cartels. Recent years have seen development in the transportation of cocaine, like Venezuela, which became the transit hub for the business. There are a number of airstrips that are implied for the transfer of cocaine to Central America. It also includes other regions like the Caribbean islands, Bahamas, Puerto Rico and the Dominion Republic.

The proximity of Panama to Colombia provides a significant place for Colombia’s criminal groups (Estrada, 2016). According to the coastal authorities and the officials, the Mexicans are supervising and training the local criminals for drug trafficking. There is also a lack of beaches, which could stop the movement of the smugglers. In recent years, the US Department has listed Guatemala, which provides the smugglers with a reliance on the routes of other border regions. In the same way, the Medellin Cartel was one of the most dangerous firms, and it originated in Colombia. The organization operated from the seventies to the eighties. Colombia, Peru, the United States, Europe, and Canada were the many regions for its trafficking and criminal movements.

The firm of the Medellin cartel was founded by the Ochoa Vazquez brothers along with Pablo Escobar. The drug trafficking eradication operation of the United States, in cooperation with the Cali Carter, has killed many members of the organization. During the increased operations of the firm, the owner smuggled tons of cocaine into different countries. The daily profit of the organization was around one hundred million. At a time, the corporation of the criminals associated with Medellin had supplied ninety per cent of cocaine to the global market along with the United States (Gaviria, 2017). The group was put under the task force on questionable activities by the state government for surveillance.

The total business and revenue of the Medellin cartel was around ten billion dollars. It influences the people and government. Many criminal groups were running the market at that time. They are Europeans, white Americans, and Canadians who gathered to transport the shipments of cocaine to Europe, Canada and the US region (Mejía, 2016). Among the members of the groups, the EL Tomotes were part of and working for the Escobar. The man was held responsible for the bombing, assassinations, and the killing of many people. He was considered the individual on the mission for revenge against his leader. There was an increase in participants from Colombian states, and few were from the United States that run the business of illicit drug trafficking. The number of attaching groups was encountered and taken down by the federal agents and the informers.

The La Oficina de Envigado is considered the partner and successor of the criminal organization of the Medellin cartel. The group has served as an enforcement wing of the Medellin Organization. After the fallout of Don Berna along with Escobar, the rivals of the Escobar have ousted the Escobar. The criminal trafficking group has links with the groups in the UK, Mexico, and the United States. It also has an association with the self-styled forces of Colombia that are operating for illicit drug movements in various regions of the world (Natarajan, 2015). The narcoterrorist and the drug lord of Colombia, Pablo Escobar, was well known internationally for his activities in supplying cocaine drugs.

With the increasing demand for better cocaine, I started working with Roberto Suarez. He helped expand the products in other regions like Asia, Europe, and America. During their height of power, Escobar brought around seventy million from the business of cocaine. By smuggling, fifteen tons of cocaine per day was worth more than half a billion dollars in the US. The Medellin cartel has control of eighty per cent of the market related to the business of cocaine. Escobar was the hero to many, and at the same time, he was an enemy of the Colombian and US governments.

Escobar was considered to have backed the attack on the Supreme Court of Colombia. As with the conventional threat for the extradition of the cocaine smugglers by the Colombian US government, he was part of the Los Extraditables. The cause of the attack was the study of the constitutional status of the Colombian extradition with the US (Niño 2015). The siege of the Supreme Court building was due to the retaliation of criminals against any strict or prolonged punishment. The controversial position of the constitution leads them to kill half of the judges of the Supreme Court. Escobar surrendered to the government after a successful negotiation and pressure from the public. He was provided with all the facilities in prison. However, as the news circulated of his criminal activities, he was sent to his current jail.

Fear of death and the hard punishment led Escobar to escape from jail. There were a number of attempts by the US joint forces to locate Escobar, but they failed, and the rest of his life passed, evading the police. Cocaine smugglers are operating all over the world, and certain steps are being taken to curb the cancer from further expansion. Despite being the leading producer of cocaine, the Colombian government has gradually diminished the drugs that are produced by the farmers (Otis, 2014). In the year two thousand ten, the state reduced the production of cocaine by sixty per cent; it was relatively at the peak in two thousand one. Similarly, according to the news of Bloomberg during the last decade, Colombia is the most significant producer of cocaine, and the US is the most significant consumer of illicit drugs.

The drug cartels influence and destroy the environment and other related sectors. Education, economy and health are the most affected areas by the cocaine and drug cartels. The cartels of the drugs profoundly damage the economic, political and social life of Colombians. The daily activities of Medellin, which is the hub of the cocaine industry, profoundly affect marginalized and mainstream citizens. By clearing the field for the cultivation of cocaine plants, the environment of Colombia is continuously damaged. Soil erosion and the chemical pollution are severely affecting the Colombia (Tickner, 2017). Certain plants provide prostitutes with their employees. There are very few advantages of drug cartels that offer jobs to most needy individuals and contribute to enhancing Colombian GDP. Overall observation of the drug cartels in Colombia contributing to the destruction of lives of the nation along with the people of the UK, USA, Peru, Venezuela and other associated regions of Colombia.

Conclusion

Concluding the discussion, the business of the drug cartels is highly influential in the lives of Colombians. The geostrategic and geopolitical location of Colombia allows drug traffickers like Medellin and Escobar to destroy the lives of neighbouring nations of their region. However, the war between the Colombian government and the drug cartels continued. The state authorities are hopeful for long-term success against the suppliers of illicit drugs through effective combat strategies. The authorities realize that unstable Colombia will negatively influence its people and other states of the world.

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