US Drug War Policies Spur Sales of Afghan Child Brides
The US Government’s Drug War has spurred many social and environmental consequences throughout the world. Widespread aerial herbicide spraying aimed at eradication has caused environmental damage from Central America to Central Asia. Recently, I learned you can add the sale of child brides in Afghanistan to the list of social ills caused by the Drug War.
A bumper crop of Afghan opium was produced in 2007, which is expected to be repeated in 2008. Despite these record poppy crops, farmers are deeply in debt. The average Afghan poppy grower’s per capita income is about $300, and farmers have to borrow money for seeds, fertilizer, food, and basic necessities from traffickers. The farmers are unable to pay their debts when their crops are eradicated, or they are pressured by local governments and westerners to stop growing. Westerners don’t keep promises to provide free seeds for substitute crops, and creditors demand child wives in payment for debts. The growers’ daughters are called “opium flowers“, and moneylenders seek them out in case of crop failure or family emergency.
It is a traditional Afghan custom for a family to pay off a debt by marrying a daughter to a relative of the creditor. Now the practice is being used to pay off debts to drug traffickers. Mr Isamuddin, 68, stopped growing poppies because of a government crack down; further up the valley helicopters sprayed the poppy fields with insecticide. He explained, “”If people here cannot earn enough to feed their families, they will start growing opium again.”
Even though production of Afghan opium is high, world demand has not increased largely. Afghanistan is accused of stockpiling opium, and the US supports aerial spraying programs for eradication. Afghan and British officials oppose aerial spraying, as it would increase support for the Taliban for fear the herbicide would poison growers and their families. The Bush administration supports expansion of eradication programs, whereas Afghanistan wants to emphasize long-term crop substitution for opium poppy plants.
One goal of the drug war is increase prices in order to deter usage, only the ones profiting from such prohibition are the drug traffickers. The farmers have tried other crops, such as wheat, but poppies bring in 10 times the amount and are hardier than grains. It is the only reliable cash crop they know. Opium growers ask for advances on their crops from the drug traffickers, which they are then unable to pay. Sayed Shah was forced to pay his debt to a trafficker with the marriage of his 9-year-old daughter. According to Newsweek:
Shah borrowed $2,000 from a local trafficker, promising to repay the loan with 24 kilos of opium at harvest time. Late last spring, just before harvest, a government crop-eradication team appeared at the family’s little plot of land in Laghman province and destroyed Shah’s entire two and a half acres of poppies… “I never imagined I’d have to pay for growing opium by giving up my daughter,” says Shah…”It’s my fate,” the child says.
Poppy eradication causes many Afghan daughters to be turned into child brides. Whether a farmer loses his crop to Drug War eradication or his substitute wheat crop fails, US policies should not be causing such practices to continue in Central Asia. “Until the end of my life I will feel shame because of what I did to my daughter,” said a former poppy grower. “I still can’t look her in the eye.”
Image: Afghan Hope Charity
of course the US and British governments support eradication spraying, the basic economic characteristic behind value is “scarcity”. by mass eradication of plants, the smaller growers that can not afford bribes to government officials will be taken out, leaving less, richer growers in the market. these people are the types that funnel money, launder, bribe etc. this is good for US and British interests because then there is a better chance that different levels of government get their beaks wet during these various transactions. a necessary (yes drugs are necessary) resource being manipulated by creating conflict… sound familiar?? this should not shock anyone.
I say good they shouldn’t be trading there children away from opium even if theres a slim chance they have to give there child away… farmers own fault… time to change… time to move forward if they grow opium now it get further embedded into there culture and it may never leave stop it now force them to find another way it is the only way they will ever progress pass drug trafficking. they lost there children cause of there own selfish greed… not US or British forces fault for stopping something that will end up in there country not the country its been growing in…
Sorry Fopps,
You can’t just wave a magic wand and change a system that has been in place for centuries. Poppy farmers grow poppies because there is a demand for opiates. These people don’t traffic drugs, they are simply farmers! If putting a seed in the ground is illegal, lock me up! You think they lost their children because of their own selfish greed? I think you need to go to Afghanistan and see why these folks will do anything they can to provide for their families…
You go ahead watch the news, read your newspaper, and support the western hemisphere’s brutalization of the middle east, but what it really comes down to is $$$.
Let’s look at another situation brewing in the mid-east: engines that burn fossil fuels. Here is an issue that affects the whole planet. So in your own verbage “time to move forward if they grow opium (fuel) now it get further embedded into there culture and it may never leave stop it now force them to find another way it is the only way they will ever progress”
P.S. There is a place, while their is a possessive modification of they.
What culture allows for the bartering of children for debt! For any father to think that this is even an OPTION is just wrong! Now, if they said, that they got their land taken away from them, that would be a more ethical decision, and a decision that i would make before trading debt for my daughter (yes, I DO have a daughter). I feel sympathy for the child (and this is what this article is trying to do), but curse the father and his culture for considering it an option!!!
It is as if a marijuana-growing father is thrown in prison for his dealings, and is separated from his child(ren), albeit on an obviously greater scale.
This is infotainment. To suggest the eradication of opium poppy causes child brides is not only incorrect (child brides happens even without opium crops) it is mainstream media infotainment, not news. This is not what I sign up to these news feeds for. Have fun with the other “won’t someone think of the children” crowd on Jerry Springer.
“Evan” can suck it because it all is true.
Grow a pair and accept the facts.
[...] in which to sell, so they are more likely to turn to crops with a guaranteed return … and opium is a crop that always finds a [...]
Evan is in denial. Can’t accept the fact that when you die you’re dead and gone too, probably believes in any one of hundreds of supernatural deities humans have created over millenia to help themselves cope (read: ignore) with the cold hard truth.