A new study reveals that cattle ranching, not cocaine, has been responsible for the devastation of the Colombian Amazon over the past four decades.
Recent governments have cited environmental concerns as justification for intensifying their war on the green shrub, but research indicates that in 2018, the quantity of forest cleared to cultivate coca, the main ingredient in cocaine, was only 1/60th that used for cattle.
The findings of the study vindicate conservationists who have long argued that Colombia’s strategy to conserve the Amazon, which is frequently concentrated on combating coca cultivation, is misguided.
The study’s leader, Pablo Murillo-Sandoval of the University of Tolima, said, “We want to ultimately dispel this myth that coca is the primary cause of deforestation.”
After the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) signed a historic peace agreement with the government in 2016 and set down their weapons, deforestation increased dramatically.
As the insurgents emerged from the jungle, land-grabbers seized the opportunity to clear trees with chainsaws and torch vast areas. In 2017, deforestation reached an all-time peak of 219,973 hectares (543,576 acres), a 23% increase from the previous year.
Former Colombian president Iván Duque justified military action against coca cultivators by citing environmental harm. As a result of the 2015 prohibition on glyphosate due to health concerns, the Duque government dispatched helicopters and armed troops into the Amazon rainforest to engage coca farmers in sometimes deadly confrontations.
Cattle farms cleared over 3 million hectares (7.4 million acres) of Amazon rainforest in 2018, while coca had little impact.
In 2018, the most recent year covered by the study, only 45,000 hectares (111,200 acres) were cleared for coca.
Using a deep learning algorithm to distinguish between coca and cattle-grazing land, Murillo and his colleagues were able to distinguish between the activities on a massive scale from 1985 to 2019.
Angelica Rojas, liaison officer for Guaviare state at the Foundation for Conservation and Sustainable Development, a Colombian environmental think tank, stated, “We have always contested the government’s argument that coca was driving deforestation, but lacked substantiation.” Now that we have accurate information, we can refute this error.
The numbers, according to Rojas, show that prior administrations used the environment to wage war on coca farmers.
“They didn’t want to prevent deforestation. They simply wanted to justify spending more money and resources on their true political objective. Which was to eradicate coca,” she said.
The study provides additional evidence that, despite the loss of lives and expenditure of billions of dollars. Colombia’s “war on drugs” has failed to halt coca production, and in some instances may have exacerbated the problem.
Murillo said farmers simply plant new areas a few kilometres deeper into the forest canopy after their crops are destroyed. “The war on drugs began forty years ago, but everyone still knows where coca is: in the same place.”
The authors argue that while the government has engaged in a game of whack-a-mole with coca farmers. The true cause of deforestation, cattle farming, has been allowed to consume vast tracts of land.
Inadequacies in Colombian land regulation have encouraged the transformation of biodiverse tropical rainforests into arid grasslands.
Landowners must demonstrate that 75% of their plots are productive to have their titles recognized, and it is much simpler for farmers to use cows than crops, according to Carlos Devia, a forest engineer at Bogotá’s Javeriana University who was not involved in the study.
“Ranching is the simplest method to demonstrate land use because it is unregulated. Devia says 10 cows can fit on 100 hectares, but potatoes and corn take a year to grow.
Oftentimes, landless farmers clear a few hectares of rainforest and unlawfully sell the land to members of criminal organizations. Who then combine multiple small parcels to create vast expanses of lifeless, arid pasture.
Last August’s Colombian president, Gustavo Petro, suggests reversing the failed anti-drug strategy.
Former member of the defunct M-19 rebel group Petro has shifted his attention away from forced coca eradication and is purchasing millions of hectares of land to distribute to farmers.
In September of last year, Petro told the United Nations General Assembly, “Reducing drug use does not require war. It requires us all to create a better society.”
