the distribution and sale are also regulated by law. But in Argentina and Chile, where the leaf is not cultivated, the supply depends on the illegal import
of the product from Bolivia and Peru, opening the door to arbitrariness, discrimina-tion and bribery.
In the three cultivating countries, the amount cultivated is strictly regulated by law and controlled by national and international inspection agencies. The export of coca is permitted for a few handpicked companies, a fact that has created a virtual
foreign monopoly of this natural resource of the Andes.
In the field of national legislation, the bolivian government is preparing to change law 1008, especially by adjusting the permitted cultivation in accordance with the real necessities of the market. There is also hope that the market will expand with the growing manufacture and promotion of a range of products made from the coca leaf. But the real test lies in the international arena,
were the highest authority is the United Nations and its conventions, the same ones that prohibit the free trade of the coca leaf.
In this forum, the will of Bolivian sovereignty is confronted by that of the United States and its empire over the concert of nations. In fact, every country, except
South Africa,, has adhered to The Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs of 1961, which enumerates the prohibited substances and includes the coca leaf in its lists.
This convention ranks higher than a national law, and the road to denounce it is arduous and will have international consequences and will possibly result in sanctions.
Untill now, the strategy of the Bolivian government has consisted
in stressing its total adhesion to the drugs conventions - even asking for more action from the US and other key nations in the fight against drugs trafficking
- while demanding that the coca leaf be taken off the UN lists. To this effect, Bolivia is pressing its case before the Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna. It will be an arduous job, since both the US and the UE oppose the idea, while no other country, not even Peru, has declared to be in favor of such a change.
Another way to obtain the exclusion of coca from the conventions leads to the World Health Organization in Geneva, where the Bolivian government wants to present its thesis on the therapeutical values of the leaf. Given the experience with the Cocaine Project, a 1995 WHO-sponsored study on coca and coaine use, which took a positie view of coca use and for that very same reason was wiped off the table under pressure from the US, it seems very unlikely that the results from a presentation in Geneva will be better then those obtained in Vienna.
On the other hand president Morales has gotten backing for his revaluation policy from the CAN, the
Community of Andean Nations, which includes Bolivia, Colombia,
Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela, while in Argentia the matter has provoked a national debate. Backed by a South-American consensus, the Bolivian claim will carry much more weight at the decisive moment, a moment that probably arrives no earlier then 2008, at the second meeting of
UNGASS, the United Nations General Asambly Special Session on Drugs.
In case all these proceedings don't bear fruit ,
the Morales government always has the option to unilaterally denounce the internacional comventions, and join South Africa in the very select club of non-signatories.
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