West Africa has become the transit route for cigarettes, counterfeit medicines, arms and people in the wake of a declining cocaine traffic from Latin America to Europe, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime said in a new report released on Tuesday.
The value of the illicit trafficking is greater than the gross domestic products of some the states in the region. UNODC said that
revenue from 45 million counterfeit anti-malarial tablets, worth 438-million dollars, is greater than Guinea-Bissau’s GDP.
Cigarettes smuggled through the region are worth 775-million dollars, more than Gambia’s entire legal economy.
UNODC said in its annual threat assessment report that West Africa has become the target of traffickers in arms, women, counterfeit medicines, toxic waste including electronic waste, oil and other natural resources including hardwoods and diamonds.
The Vienna-based UNODC said that Latin American traffickers have used West Africa for years to feed Europe with about a quarter of its cocaine addiction. In 2006, about 40 tons of cocaine transited the region to Europe.
But cocaine trafficking through West Africa has shown signs of a decline, and law enforcement and anti-drug organizations have detected lower volume of cocaine entering Europe in the last 18 months.
Bunkering oil and cocaine, worth billions of dollars each, have transited through West Africa to other countries. The revenues are equivalent to the GDPs of Cape Verde or Sierra Leone.
”Less drugs are flowing through West Africa,” UNODC executive director Antonio Maria Costa said. ”We must ensure that this downward trend continues.”
The report studied the value and size of various smuggling flows and the routes and methods used by traffickers.
”West Africa has everything that criminals need: resources, a strategic location, weak governance, and an endless source of foot soldiers who see few viable alternatives to a life of crime,” Costa said.
The report said while cocaine trafficking is declining, it still inflicts a destabilizing effects on the region’s security. About 20 tons passed through the region with a street value of $1-billion at destination.
It said Nigeria was losing 55 million barrels of oil a year, or a 10th of its production, to theft and smuggling, known as oil
bunkering. The phenomenon is a source of pollution, corruption and revenue for insurgents and criminal groups in the Niger Delta.
It said as much as 80% of the cigarettes sold in some West and North African countries are illicit. At least half or more of all medications used in West Africa may be sub-standard or counterfeit, a source of increasing health risks in a region that has high demand for anti-infective and anti-malarial drugs. Counterfeits can contribute to the development of drug resistant strains in some illnesses.
West Africa is a dumping ground for electronic waste, including old computers and mobile phones, which contain heavy metals and
other toxins. UNODC said the European Union produces alone 8,7-million tons of e-waste a year. — Sapa, AP