Glyphosate alone won’t fix Colombia’s complex coca woes
Former President Juan Manuel Santos criticized the “high human cost” of forced eradication
Thursday, March 14, 2019
Colombia’s Constitutional Court is debating lifting a judicial ban on the spraying of glyphosate during the aerial fumigation of illicit coca crops, a decision that is unlikely to fix the nation’s coca problems. The court announced that it would accept President Iván Duque’s request for a hearing to debate the lifting of a 2015 ban on the aerial spraying with the herbicide glyphosate. Colombia Attorney General Humberto Martínez and Defense Minister Guillermo Botero supported Duque’s request that the Court permit a return to the use of glyphosate during aerial fumigation, arguing that the current methods being used have been ineffective. (See also: Colombia cocaine production breaks new record levels: UNODC report | Aggressive coca eradication threatens voluntary substitution efforts in Colombia)
