Bolivia looks to coca to energize its economy

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Bolivia has almost doubled the area where farmers can legally grow coca, the base plant for cocaine. The goal is to meet the demand for traditional uses, like chewing the leaf or making tea.

But critics worry it could boost the illegal drug trade.

Chapare Province lies in the subtropical lowlands of Bolivia, its dense forests providing perfect cover for the illegal coca labs used to make cocaine.

But Bolivia is also the only country in the world where the government has designated land to legally grow coca crops. The leaf has been chewed in the Andes for thousands of years to ward off hunger and fatigue.

Wilden Rosas is one of Bolivia’s many legal small-scale coca growers. He invited CGTN to visit his 10-hectare farm which he cut out of the forest.

“It’s just enough to make a living, we have no other choice,” said Coca farmer Wilden Rosas. “There are no alternatives.”

Rosas produces around 200 kilos of the leaf a year. To do so legally, he must be a member of the Coca Growers Union and sell all he produces to the state. The new law almost doubles the area for authorized coca crops from 12,000 to 22,000 hectares.

One of the reasons the government decided to increase the amount of legal coca cultivation was that the existing area wasn’t large enough to meet local consumption.

Critics argue this will provide more coca that can be consumed, and the excess will be diverted to the illegal drug trade.

Bolivia’s President Evo Morales, who is also head of the Coca Growers Federation, argued that legal farms help monitor production while providing a future for the region.

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