REPORTE MUNDIAL DE DROGAS - LIBRO NRO 3: SUMINISTRO DE DROGAS

WORLD DRUG REPORT 2020
DRUG SUPPLY
seized globally in 2018 (close to 56 per cent), with
the largest quantities seized being reported by the
Islamic Republic of Iran, followed by Afghanistan
and Pakistan.
Accounting for 9 per cent of the global total in 2018,
the quantities of heroin and morphine seized in East
and South-East Asia declined slightly in 2018. Most
heroin and morphine seizures in that subregion in
2018 were again reported by China, accounting for
more than half (53 per cent) of all such seizures,
followed by Viet Nam, Malaysia, Myanmar, Thailand
and the Lao People’s Democratic Republic.
Quantities of heroin and morphine seized in other
subregions of Asia appear to have remained quite
stable in 2018. That overall stable level obscures,
however, the partial climb in heroin and morphine
seizures reported in Central Asia and Transcaucasia
following years of ongoing declines, and the decline
in 2018 of seizures in South Asia, which follows a
series of strong increases up to 2017.
Quantities of heroin and morphine
seized have reached record levels in
Europe
The largest total quantity of heroin and morphine
seized in a region outside Asia is that reported for
Europe (22 per cent of the global total in 2018),
which is an important market for the consumption
of heroin. Heroin and morphine seized in Eastern
and South-Eastern Europe continued to account
for the bulk (66 per cent) of all such quantities seized
in Europe in 2018, with most of the heroin and
morphine seized in the region continuing to be
reported by Turkey (62 per cent), followed by Western
and Central Europe (31 per cent) and Eastern
Europe (3 per cent) in 2018.
The quantities of heroin and morphine seized in
Europe more than doubled in 2017 and rose by a
further 24 per cent in 2018 to reach a record level
of 30 tons, thus exceeding the previous record level
of 29 tons in 2008. While the strongest increase in
the quantities of heroin and morphine seized in
2017 was reported in Eastern and South-Eastern
Europe (the same year as the bumper opium harvest
reported in Afghanistan), the strongest increase in
2018 was reported in Western and Central Europe
(89 per cent). This suggests that it may take a year
from when opium is harvested in Afghanistan until
it is manufactured into the heroin that ends up on
the streets of Western and Central Europe. There
were increases in heroin and morphine seizures in
Europe in the countries along the Balkan route in
2018, although most of the increase was due to an
increase in the quantities of heroin and morphine
seized in Belgium and, to a lesser extent, in France
and Italy.
In contrast to Western and Central Europe as a
whole, which continues to be supplied mainly by
heroin trafficked along the Balkan route by land,
trafficking to Belgium in 2018 to a large extent (98
per cent) took the form of maritime shipments
departing from the Islamic Republic of Iran or
Turkey. Similarly, trafficking to Italy was characterized
by maritime shipments in 2018 (61 per cent
of the total quantity seized by customs authorities),
with the bulk of seizures in 2018 having departed
from the Islamic Republic of Iran in containers, followed
by shipments by air (37 per cent), often
departing from the Middle East (Qatar) or Africa
(South Africa), while heroin shipments destined for
France typically transited the Netherlands and Belgium
in 2018. 3 The overall largest quantities of
heroin and morphine seized in Western and Central
Europe in 2018 were reported by Belgium, followed
by France, Italy, the United Kingdom and the
Netherlands.
Seizures of heroin and morphine in Eastern and
South-Eastern Europe, which had tripled in 2017,
rose by a further 6 per cent in 2018. Turkey continued
to account for the bulk of heroin and morphine
seized in that subregion (95 per cent). Quantities
of heroin and morphine seized in Eastern Europe
rose by 60 per cent in 2018, partly reversing the
long-term downward trend in such seizures. Most
of these seizures were reported by the Russian
Federation.
Quantities of heroin and morphine
seized are on the rise in the Americas
Quantities of heroin and morphine seized in the
Americas rose by 9 per cent in 2017 and by a further
8 per cent in 2018 to reach 10 tons.
Heroin trafficking in the Americas remains concentrated
in North America. The subregion accounted
3 UNODC, responses to the annual report questionnaire.
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