1. "Colombia accounts for an estimated two percent of the world's opium poppy"
from International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, 1999

U.S. State Department figures for heroin production, in metric tons.Sources:

International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, 1999

International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, 1998

International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, 1997

Heroin production estimates calculated by the following method: 75 hectares opium poppies = 10 MT opium gum = 1MT heroin.

2. As recently as 1996, most of the heroin in America was said to come from Myanmar.

"The key to effective U.S. heroin control efforts in Southeast Asia is stopping the flow of Burmese heroin into the United States. In 1994, Burma accounted for about 87 percent of the opium cultivated in Southeast Asia and approximately 94 percent of the opium production in the region. Most of the heroin smuggled into the United States originates in Burma's eastern Shan State."

Drug Control: U.S. Heroin Program Encounters Many Obstacles in Southeast Asia (Letter Report, 03/01/96, GAO/NSIAD-96-83).

"China is now the principal route for heroin smuggled out of Burma, with roughly 90 percent of seizures of Southeast Asian heroin occurring within Chinese borders."

International Narcotics Control Strategy Report, 1999

3. The General Accounting Office estimates that Americans consume between 10 and 15 metric tons of heroin per year. This works out to between 2.5% to 4% of the world's production of heroin, which is about 400 metric tons per year.

Drug Control: U.S. Heroin Program Encounters Many Obstacles in Southeast Asia (Letter Report, 03/01/96, GAO/NSIAD-96-83).

However, the United States has about 5% of the world's population. Could it be that heroin use in the United States is below average, in terms of world demographics?



How could Colombia produce 80% of the US supply if it only produces 2% of the world's supply? That would mean that US heroin addicts only consume three percent of the world's heroin.

"On the opium poppy front, spray activity has prevented the expansion of the opium poppy crop, which has remained essentially stable for several years."

Rand Beers, Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control, 9/21/99

"Although Mexico produces only about two percent of the world's opium, nearly all of its harvested illicit crop is converted into heroin and shipped to the western United States. "USG estimates of opium drug crop production during the past three years show yields of some 4 to 6 metric tons of heroin [from Mexico] annually."

Ibid.
http://www.usdoj.gov/dea/traffickers/mexico.htm Today, 14 percent of the heroin seized in the United States comes from Mexico and a recent independent study indicates that Mexico is the source of 29 percent of the heroin used in the United States today. It is estimated that organized crime figures in Mexico produced 6 metric tons of heroin in 1998.