Colombia Wants Its Cocaine Monsanto-Free, Thank You Kindly

Editor’s Note: This is one instance where the cure, as they say, is worse than the disease.

You should be able to get Monsanto-weedkiller-free cocaine soon, if Columbia’s president gets his way.

Now that the World Health Organization has announced that Monsanto’s glyphosate weedkiller (i.e. Roundup), is truly, madly, deeply toxic (see the original research here), Colombia is pushing back. Specifically, President Juan Manuel Santos wants the country’s National Drug Council (which is, of course, backed by United States war-on-drugs money) to quit using glyphosate to destroy coca fields.

While Columbia has traditionally used Roundup to wipe out cocaine production (although apparently not very efficiently, as Columbia has now overtaken Peru as the world’s top cocaine producer), local farmers have long been livid that not only is glyphosate being sprayed on coca crops, but that it also settles on nearby legal crops.

Via the Guardian:

Picture a red jeep bumping up and down a longish, straight, red dirt road in rural Colombia and, coming from the opposite direction, one lone motorcyclist. The two vehicles draw near and stop. “Amigo, we have problems,” says the motorcyclist to the jeep driver, “they’re fumigating.” “Where?” He gestures back in the direction the jeep has come from. “Two planes.”

That was all that was said. Nothing else required. The motorcyclist sped off to do whatever you do when you’re faced with such a terrifying prospect: planes spraying your home, land and loved ones – or the home, land and loved ones of someone you know – with a cocktail of chemicals including glyphosate…

(read more at Ultra Culture)