SIDEBAR

• Women Reap Fruits of Anti-Drug Battle

Women's anti-drug task forces have been active in Yingjiang County since 2002, when 1,449 of the county's 4,254 registered addicts have attended rehabilitation sessions organised by the women. To date, 536 abusers have completely cut the habit.

Nonetheless, the whole province of Yunnan, which has a 2,184-kilometre borderline with Myanmar, is still confronting with the grave spread of narcotics. In 2001 the province confiscated 8,731 kilogrammes of drugs, more than 70 percent of all drugs seized in China in the year.

Over the past years, drug dealers in the Golden Triangle of Myanmar, Laos and Thailand had intensified narcotics smuggling into China through northern Myanmar.

Latest statistics from the National Narcotics Control Commission (NNCC) show that the number of registered drug addicts in China reached one million by the end of 2002, an 11 percent rise over the previous year. About 80 percent of the addicts were younger than 35 years of age.

The statistics also reveal that heroin remains the principal narcotic for Chinese addicts, with 87.6 percent of them taking the "white killer," while more and more begin to try new drugs such as crystal methamphetamine and the amphetamine ecstasy, known as the "head-shaking pill" in China.

To prevent the drugs from running rampant in China, China is trying to cut off the roots of drug inflow from Yunnan through the gateway of Myanmar.

The Chinese government and Yunnan province have joined international efforts in launching an anti-drug project by substituting opium poppy crops with cash crops such as rice, sugarcane, rubber and tea in the Golden Triangle.

The Green Anti-drug Project, jointly sponsored by the three countries, aims to help local people, who have been growing poppies for years, to find new ways to earn their livings.

Yunnan province has allocated 300 million yuan (360,000 U.S. dollars) and assigned 3,000 agricultural professionals to help farmers in Laos and Myanmar implement the project.

China has bought back the harvest in Laos and Myanmar at a price equivalent to its average domestic purchasing price to motivate farmers' participation in the project.

The project has not only reduced the cropping area of opium poppies but also greatly enhanced the living standards of the local farmers. — Ma Guihua