US is world's top cocaine consumer, Europe catching up

New Delhi, Jun 29 (UNI) The United States continued to be the world's largest cocaine consumer, and the trafficking of the drug remained highly organised, dominated by some very large organisations, says the UN World Drug Report for 2007.

Some 88 per cent of the cocaine destined for the USA transits the Central America/Mexico corridor, about 50 per cent along the Pacific and 38 per cent along the Caribbean caost of Central America.

Most of the drug flow is maritime and given the cost and complexity of trafficking on the high seas, it is clear that it involves high level of organisation, says the Report The largest cocaine seizures invlove multiple tons of the drug and are worth tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars.

Such shipments are clearly beyond the scope of small networks of individual traffickers.

The share of large seizures in national totals highlights the fact that, while samll scale trafficking does take place, the backbone of the market remains in the hands of more sophisticated operators.

For example, in 2004, more than 25 per cent of the cocaine seized in Honduras came from just one maritime seizure, while 42 per cent of that seized in Nicaragua came from two major seizures on the Atlantic coast.

The Report also says that cocaine is trafficked to Europe via the Carribean region and, increasingly via Africa.

During 2000-205, seizures rose sixfold, and in west and central Europe, they rose fourfold.

The largest seizures of cocaine in Europe in 2005 were made by Spain, followed by Portugal and Netherlands, reflecting both strong national law enforcement activities and the increase in trafficking towards these countries--which contain vibrant consumer markets and which are the main entry points of the drug into the European market.

Rising levels of seizures in Africa reflect the fact that this continent is increasingly being used as a transshipment point for cocaine from South America to markets in western Europe.

While the consumer market in North America has ceased to expand, cocaine is making worrying inroads into new and growing markets.

Consumption increased significantly in Europe, doubling and tripling in several countries over the last decade.

However, overall consumption of the drug in Europe was still lower than in North America. But Spain recently reported that for the first time, cocaine annual prevalence levels exceeded those of the USA in 2005.

High and rising levels of cocaine use have also been reported from the UK and Italy.

UNI