What is the reason for the fall in the coca trade in Colombia?

2023-09-24 22:10:38

Noralba Galvis usually returns to her village in the Colombian jungle with fresh supplies of rice, meat, salt and other foods packed in bags. However, today, when this 40-year-old woman boards a boat to begin the two-hour trip along the Putumayo River, she only carries a cardboard box.

“My mother gave me these chicks,” he explains: “Chickens are an excellent resource in times of emergency like this, when there is nothing left to eat.” Like most farmers in Putumayo – a vast southern department where the Andes meet the Amazon and where Colombia borders Ecuador and Peru – Galvis depends on selling coca to make a living.