Bolivia gets aid for coca growers. Venezuela to buy all legal products.

[Doondoo]

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has found a novel way to dispense foreign aid: by promising to underwrite coca production in Bolivia.

Chavez says Venezuela will buy whatever legal products Bolivia can make from coca leaf, as part of that southern Andean nation's attempt to wean farmers from the cocaine industry. The promise could finance the production of some 4,000 tonnes of coca leaf in Bolivia, Venezuelan officials say.

Possible coca-based products include soap, bread, herbal teas, toothpaste, unspecified medicines and cooking oils. No dollar amount for Venezuela's support has been announced.

Three factories are under construction in Bolivia with Venezuelan financial and Cuban technical support, and production could begin this summer.

The pledge is the latest in a series of foreign aid promises as Chavez tries to expand his influence and promote his "Bolivarian" revolution – referencing Simon Bolivar, leader of successful revolutions in colonial South America.



http://www.thestar.com/News/article/185454

[AnOhioan]

1. Go Chavez...better plan than our failed "War on Drugs".

[MasonJar]

2. Now that is a sensible and workable answer. Leave it to Chavez

to come up with a plan that helps the average worker while it gets rid of a damaging product.

[Skink]

3. Must know that Barak will legalize it.

:hangover:

[ohio2007]

5. ? s So the factories he built can easily retool

to supply the opium of the masses ?

hmmm.

[High Plains]

7. Ridiculous post.

Peasants in Peru and Bolivia have been growing coca for milennia, long before the white man figured out how to extract the cocaine alkaloid and shove it up his nose. There is a huge potential market for coca products, as the article indicated. The industrialization of coca will be a tremendous boon to these countries, and every coca leaf that goes into toothpaste or wheat or tea is one coca leave that won't go into the black market for cocaine. If the US government were smart (ha ha), it would be supporting this move. But no, our government would prefer to eradicate all the coca and the traditional way of life with which it is associated instead.

By the way, there is no opium grown in Bolivia, a tiny amount grown in Peru, and a slightly larger amount grown in Colombia. More than 90% of the world's opium comes from Afghanistan, but you knew that already, right?

[Vidar]

4. Bravo Chavez!

[killbotfactory]

6. You can almost see Condi Rice scowl when reading this

It's only a matter of time they accuse Chavez of being a drug kingpin.

[Hunky Dunky]

8. I'll bet Huggy Bear Hugo

Does his share of chewing on that coca leaf!! LOL!

[High Plains]

9. I don't know if he does or not, but if he does...

...he would be joining millions of other Latin American in doing so.

Cup of coffee, anyone?

[Hunky Dunky]

11. Absolutely!

I've been South America (Venez., Colombia) a few times, and many do love their coca jolt. My guess is that Chavez probably likes it more than most. He is excessive in many of his manners and attributes so I assume that it extends to chewing and drinking. It certainly extends to eating!

[pitohui]

10. well good for him, better than the usa idea of deforesting the entire country EOM

,

[John Q. Citizen]

12. Wow, better than spraying people animals ands crops with poison.

[w4rma]

13. Good. (nt)