Posted by Tina
The Shared Responsibility program aims to educate US and European cocaine users about the environmental damage of cocaine production. *** Millions of Americans use cocaine, but few of them consider the millions of acres of forest that have been cleared by coca growers in all corners of Colombia or the blue-billed curassow, a turkey-sized bird that is losing habitat to coca farming. *** Ana Maria Caballero believes that many recreational cocaine users are well-educated professionals who also recycle, drive hybrid vehicles, and buy fair-trade products, but that they just dont understand what cocaine is doing to Colombias environment. *** Ms. Caballero works for Shared Responsibility, the Colombian governments effort to raise consumer awareness of cocaines impact on one of the worlds most biodiverse nations. The project is led by Vice President Francisco Santos Caldern, who has more than a passing interest in narco-traficking he was once kidnapped and held for months by Pablo Escobars Medelln Cartel. *** Colombias decades-old, drug-funded, armed conflict is complicated, says Caballero, but environmental devastation is apolitical. When you talk about deforestation, when you talk about a specific species being threatened because coca is encroaching upon its sole habitat, theres no political argument there, she says. Its absolutely black and white. You are destroying natural treasures that belong to the world. *** According to Shared Responsibility, 43 square feet of forest are cleared to produce one gram of cocaine, and coca growers have cleared an area the size of New JerseyClandestine cocaine laboratories, which use an array of toxic chemicals, pollute once-pristine waters in remote areas. And slash-and-burn clearing for coca farms is one of the countrys largest sources of air pollution. The clearing also accelerates global climate change, which is shrinking Colombias mountaintop glaciers.
The debate over legalizing drugs continues. This effort, to create awareness, has proven effective in the anti-smoking and green movementswill it work for (guilt ridden) eco-friendly drug users?