Inside an Afghan opium market

Daily Times ^ | Thursday, August 30, 2007 | Bilal Sarwary

[gandalftb]

On Afghanistan’s main Jalalabad to Torkham road is Shaddle Bazaar, in eastern Nangarhar.

This is one of Afghanistan’s biggest opium markets.

Thousands of kilos are bought and sold every day. Tension is visible, there is shouting over prices and quality. There are big scales to weigh the opium - Gul Mohammad is counting out Pakistani rupees.

He buys hundreds of kilos every day, the smell is everywhere. Vehicles come and go constantly. A man carries a bag of hundreds of thousands of Afghanis. The dealers all carry pistols.

Customers bring opium packed secretly, they refer to it as maal.

Abdullah Jan: “I left at four in the morning and got here after four hours. I have brought 10kg of opium from my fields to sell.”

After a hard bargain he gets $1,400. The opium is taken to border areas to heroin labs.

The market has been raided several times but it has re-opened again and again. For Gul Mohammad Khan being a opium trader is his way of surviving. “If we had roads, clinics, factories and if there were job opportunities I would not do what I am doing now,” he said. He has never been arrested. Current prices are anywhere from 10,000 Afghanis ($201) for a kilo of dry opium - that is the best quality - to around 5,500 Afghanis ($110) for wet opium.

Haji Deen Gul is selling 20kg of opium, is critical of the government. “They should target the ones who are selling the heroin to Western countries. I sell my opium to feed my family and from my heroin they can even make medicine. When I have water and roads provided to me, I will stop growing poppies.”

[gandalftb]

There are alternative crops such as tobacco. That is what Pakistan introduced to limit poppy production. But you have to have all weather, maintained roads. 9% of Afghanistan has electricity, nearly all of it in Kabul and Kandahar. The first road between its two major cities was just completed.

[2banana]

When I have water and roads provided to me, I will stop growing poppies.”

BS ALERT - it will just make growing and transporting opium that much easier...

[milwguy]

This may sound strange, but we should have the gov’t set up an ‘alternate’ opium market and pay double what the going price is. For the 14 billion we spend each year, we could buy up all the supply and have money to spare. No different than the subsidies the ethanol whores are getting in our country right now.

[GeorgefromGeorgia]

Somewhere in the World someone will be growing opium.

[monday]

“There are alternative crops such as tobacco.”

Does it sell for $200 a kilo?

[monday]

” For the 14 billion we spend each year, we could buy up all the supply and have money to spare. “

lol, You could spend 100 billion a year and not buy up all the supply. All your money would do is increase demand. In a supply and demand market, like the opium market, increased demand means increased supply. You would certainly be a hero to opium growers though.

[John Will]

Morphine comes from poppies to.

[jackieaxe]

“There are alternative crops such as tobacco.” Does it sell for $200 a kilo?

No, but when you add taxes it does. A carton of Marlboros goes for about $40. Is there 2.2 pounds of tobacco is 5 cartons? As illogical as it sounds, $220/kilo sounds about right.