Cocaine Unwrapped Seifert, Rachael (Director) 2011. UK: Dartmouth Films. The film is about 83 minutes and 54 seconds in length.
Introduction
The documentary addresses the most common economic disparity resulting from cocaine trafficking as the issue of war on drug is concerned. The film contributes to a clear understanding of the economic and social effects of the war on drugs on specification in cocaine dealing. The understanding is done through two accounts of the documentary. First, the film shows how the young people in every developed city are linked with the poor peasants in Columbia through cocaine line connection. Secondly, the film documents on the deliberate attempt of formulators and sometimes the implementers of policies meant to communicate the effects of cocaine to the sufferers of the economic and social chain of cocaine.
Rachel addresses the cocaine growth in the Andean drug industry for the last twenty years has resulted to cocaine being a major economic significant exported commodity after petroleum. Cocaine drug traffickers are estimated to reap $9-10 billion annual revenues. Cocaine also accounts for approximately two-thirds of the illicit drugs spending in the United States; in 1993, this was estimated to be $31 billion of $49 billion of the country’s retail market. She also confirms that the US spending on cocaine is more than the spending on magazines, newspaper, gas utilities and airline tickets.
Though cocaine is a significant tradable item in the markets today, the narrators address the Bolivia and Colombia coca farmers to be struggling for survival. The farmers and abusers of cocaine and the governments are mostly the economic losers in the unbalanced trading of cocaine. Drug lords and their associates are the vital beneficiaries of the cocaine trade.
The advocated policy is the making of choice between the bad and the good. The documentation of the government actions in the war on drugs is addressed in such a way that they are felt to be detrimental the farmers. Farmers in the documentary give testimonies on why they engage in coca farming despite the common destruction of their farms by the anti-drugs agencies.
Evo Morales in the interview says, “Money is power and the cocaine industry clearly uses that potent instrument in Bolivia thus making it challenging to deal with the criminal acts without interfering with farmers”. This statement by the former president of Bolivia is relevant to the context of the whole issue of the economic power of cocaine, which assists its significant growth upon prohibition by governments. Evo was a significant person in the administration of Bolivia and thus a credible source of information on the reality of cocaine.
For several years, cocaine is documented to have been the most politically and socially costly enterprise. Though this is prevalent, the cocaine dynamic capitalism is known little. It is fundamental that cocaine is an economic phenomenon (De Franco, 400). In Colombia, Bolivia and generally in South America cocaine is wealth producer (Thoumi, 109). The transit centers (Andean States and Mexico) of the illegal cocaine entering the US confirm the intertwined connection between the legal economy and the illegal cocaine economy.
The connection is exhibited by the documented illicit activities that are associated with cocaine. Among them are the common economic jargons like corruption, moral decay, violence and delegitimizing of government. Mexico is given as an example of the nations that have invested much on fighting the plight of cocaine dealers and organized crimes. The cost of this fight in the US and Mexico is estimated at 60,000 deaths in six years (Healy, 140).
The documentary is highly recommendable for people wishing to get clear consent on the social, political and more importantly the economic effects of cocaine and the 1971 declared war on drugs. Personally, I feel like the film was an eye opener and I learn much on the connection between coca farmers, policies on drugs, drug dealers and the global economy.
Works cited
De Franco, Mario, and Ricardo Godoy. "The economic consequences of cocaine production in Bolivia: Historical, local, and macroeconomic perspectives." Journal of Latin American Studies 24.2 (1992): 375-406.
http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract;jsessionid=46E0A22C53DFF2583588A718F65947CC.journals?fromPage=online&aid=3125896
Healy, Kevin. "The boom within the crisis: Some recent effects of foreign cocaine markets on Bolivian rural society and economy." Coca and Cocaine. Cultural Survival Report 23 (1986): 101-143.
Thoumi, Francisco E. "Illegal drugs in Colombia: from illegal economic boom to social crisis." The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 582.1 (2002): 102-116.
http://ann.sagepub.com/content/582/1/102.short
