Soldiers guard packages of marijuana at a military base in Tijuana. Mexican soldiers discovered 12 ton of marijuana in trucks at Mexico's border with California last year. REUTERS/Jorge DuenesIn Mexico, A High Point For Pot Farms -- Miami Herald/McClatchy News
With authorities focusing on other areas, Mexico's marijuana trade is reaping the benefits, drawing business in the U.S.
CORRE COYOTE, Mexico -- Times are good for the dope growers of the western Sierra Madre mountains. The army eradication squads that once hacked at the illicit marijuana fields have been diverted by the drug war that's raging elsewhere in Mexico.
The military's retreat has delighted farmers who are sowing and reaping marijuana. Cannabis cultivation in Mexico soared 35 percent last year and is now higher than at any time in nearly two decades, the State Department says.
It's also been a boon for Mexico's powerful organized-crime groups.
Read more ....
My Comment: I live in Quebec, and I have a farm a few miles from the U.S. border. Every summer when I check the property, I am always finding small pot plantations here and there. This is not an isolated incident, all of my neighbors have the same problem, and we all know that criminal gangs are behind this type of enterprise.
Fortunately, the police in Quebec are nowhere near the corruption levels that exist in Mexico, but it is very disquieting to see how narcotics and drugs can quickly transform what was once a poor but peaceful country like Mexico (a place that I visited every year in the 1980s) .... into what it is today. And need we not forget .... but the first cash crop for Mexico's drug cartels was marijuana, providing the seed money to enter other criminal activities including heroin, cocaine, and God only knows what else.
4 comments:
Yikes. That amazes me. What do you do about this problem when you discover it every year?
After making sure there are no booby traps, I rip them out of the ground.
Thanks for the reply. I only asked because I was shocked that it occurs yearly on your property and wondered if you involved the police. Where I live in Southeastern Connecticut we are increasingly encountering this same problem. The authorities unfortunately don't seem to be getting a handle on it.
The police are involved, they send helicopters that locate the larger plantations. But many of the growers are now using smaller plots to avoid detection. I have over 200 acres on my farm/vineyard, of which 50 acres is used for grape cultivation .... the rest I rent out to a corn grower. It is in the corn that they plant their illegal crops.
One farm near Dunham, Quebec, (a few miles from my place and the U.S. border) had over 1,000 plants growing on his lot. But in this case, it was the police that found it.
Post a Comment