Laborers uproot a 6-foot-tall coca bush near the town of Nechi. Their mission is dangerous. This year, in this region alone, one police guard and one laborer have been killed and seven wounded by mines and snipers. Chris Kraul / Los Angeles TimesIn Colombia, Ground Crews A Bigger Part Of
The Cocaine Battle -- L.A. Times
The Cocaine Battle -- L.A. Times
Aerial spraying is still the preferred method of coca eradication but the use of manual laborers is expanding. Many take the dangerous job because of good wages; some have more personal reasons.
Reporting from Nechi, Colombia -- Cesar Lopez and his crew resemble human weed eaters, dispensing with 15 acres of illegal crops a day in the sweltering hills of north-central Colombia.
Guarded by a cordon of 120 anti-narcotics police officers, the group uses metal rods to uproot bush after bush on the steep hillside. In a gully below stands a thatched-roof laboratory where farmers processed a kilogram of coca paste a week, worth about $1,000 each, before fleeing last month, police said.
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My Comment: The men who eradicate the cocoa fields .... they must have one of the most thankless jobs in the world.