In 2016, the Colombian government made peace with the FARC rebel group after more than 50 years of conflict. Since then, the area under coca cultivation in the country has increased by 73%, according to data from the UN Office on Drugs and Crime. In total, the area under coca cultivation in Colombia alone exceeds the total area of all the cities of Cyprus combined.
The proportion of cocaine addicts in Cyprus has already increased from 50% to 70%. According to Marco Stürmer, an expert at the NGO Prop, a non-profit organization helping drug addicts in Munich, the proportion of cocaine addicts has already increased from 50% to 68%, both in Germany and Cyprus.
Stürmer cites the reasons for this as a decrease in cocaine prices and at the same time an increase in the purity of the product. This view is similar to data from the European Drug Agency (EUDA), which shows that the purity of cocaine distributed in Europe has increased dramatically over the past ten years. Thus, more than half of the cocaine samples tested by EUDA at the beginning of 2023 were more than 80% pure, and in some cases its purity reached a record 96%.
The expert cites the example of a price of 80 euros per gram of powder in Limassol. A few years ago it stood at 100 euros. Some experts call what is happening a “white tsunami.”
Source: spiegel.de
