News / Economic Divide

Drug trafficking trade

Thursday, 05 March 2020 1:20 AM [ Last Update: Thursday, 05 March 2020 7:47 AM ]

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The trafficking of drugs is without doubt the largest illegal business in the world, with money being made in the Billions.

From the cocaine producers of Columbia, the opium fields of Afghanistan, the Cannabis farms of Europe and the synthetic chemical kitchens springing up everywhere, the drug industry is a market thriving on the misery of others. However, the sad fact of the matter is that the end users of any drug find themselves in a position that is very hard to get out of, with addiction being a major contributor to crime, as the addicts find ever more desperate ways to fund their habits, either through legitimate or illegal means.

n 1971, President Richard Nixon declared a war on drugs, and since that time, the US alone has spent well over 1 Trillion Dollars on drug prevention and incarceration, yet, the problem persists. The US in 2014 announced that American drug users had spent over $100 Billion dollars on illegal drugs in the past decade, costing the US taxpayer around $193 Billion in lost productivity, which includes the likes of healthcare, education, criminal justice and prevention.

When this is compared to other budgets in the US, such as $39 Billion on energy, and 29 Billion on science, we can see that the costs of drugs are wider than just prevention and detection alone. How individual states deal with drug traffickers and users varies widely across the globe.

The US, as we know relies heavily on penitentiary correction facilities, which in reality, are just breeding grounds for further violations and drug use and distribution. The United Kindgom has a major drugs problem with the Island nation being labeled as the drugs market of Europe. It has been estimated that the cost to the UK in dealing with the drug industry is around £10.7 Billion per year, to attempt to control a drug market worth in the region of £6 Billion per year.

But with the UK sinking further and further into poverty due to the post-Brexit slump, many people in the UK are turning to illegal activities to fund themselves, with the poorer communities in the UK being one of the most abundant places in which drugs are bought and consumed.

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