The Growing of Coca in Bolivia

This article points out that without the growing of coca in Bolivia, there would be much more unemployment and hunger. The sale of coca there is legal and controlled by union markets.
This is excerpted from Dangl's new book,"The Price of Fire: Resource Wars and Social Movements in Bolivia."-->

"When Zurita had finished spraying a section of the crop, she sat down in the shade. Between gulps of water, she told me of the mobilizations she participated in as a union leader. She saw her life shaped by her struggle against militarization and coca eradication. In a women's march from Cochabamba to La Paz from December 1995 to January 1996, she told me, coca farmers demanded an end to the violence in the Chapare. They also demanded a meeting with President Sánchez de Lozada's wife, who refused. "They didn't understand our situation, and so we began a hunger strike, which lasted 12 days," she said.

Through coca unions, numerous blockades and protests have been organized to defend the farmers' right to grow coca. A highway that goes through the Chapare links the economically booming city of Santa Cruz to Cochabamba and La Paz. Blocking this important route puts pressure on the government to meet cocalero demands. Blockades constructed out of dirt, rocks, logs and tires are sometimes sustained for weeks, or are spontaneous and mobile, harder for security forces to break up. Blockade committees are developed by coca unions with a structure and leadership in place that allows blockaders to coordinate their work and activities.

Yet coca unions have done much more than protest. Zurita said that a goal of her work is "to bring the women ahead, by organizing, empowering and orienting them and setting up seminars. [Many] women in the Chapare don't know how to read or write. So the best school for the women is the union. There, we have empowered people. We learn about which laws are in favor of us and which are not. This has all shown us that the union organization is important to defend mother earth, defend the coca and defend our natural resources …"

Dangl, Benjamin, “The U.S. ‘War on Drugs’ Is an Assault on South America’s Poorest”, AKPress, April 12. 2007

Post By Alexandra Chunn