Myanmar’s junta growing more opium than ever

Myanmar has been growing more opium since the 2021 coup, reversing a six-year decline between 2014 and 2020, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) has said.

During the first full opium growing season since the military took power in February 2021, Myanmar saw a 33% increase in poppy cultivation and an 88% increase in potential opium yield in 2022, according to Aljazeera.

In numbers, that equates to slightly more than 40,000 hectares of poppy cultivated last year in Myanmar with a possible yield of 790 tons of opium – the highly addictive narcotic that can be processed to make heroin, according to the UN agency.

“The 2022 results confirm a significant expansion is underway of Myanmar’s opium economy,” the UNODC said in a statement released yesterday to accompany the publication of the Myanmar Opium Survey 2022.

A perfect storm of “economic, security and…