Opium Poppy Cultivation Research Articles

Use of Opioids in Hand Surgery

Ever since the Sumerians referred to the opium poppy as hul gil, or “plant of joy,” around 4000 bc, opium-derived substances have been popular for their stimulation of analgesia and euphoria. The recorded cultivation of opium poppy spans the ancient civilizations of Egypt and Persia, to the Greek and Roman empires, to China and contemporary Europe. Morphine was purified from opium in 1805, and heroin was introduced by Bayer as a cough suppressant nearly a century later. Morphine is produced in quantities of more than 1,000 tons per year, with Americans consuming four fifths of the global opioid supply. Hydrocodone-containing products were the second most commonly prescribed medication in 2006, with more than 130 million prescriptions dispensed in the United States. OxyContin (Purdue Pharma, Cranbury, NJ) contains a controlled-release version of oxycodone and is currently the most frequently abused prescription opioid. 1 Manchikanti L. Singh A. Therapeutic opioids: a ten-year perspective on the complexities and complications of the escalating use, abuse, and non-medical use of opioids. Pain Physician. 2008; 11: 63-88 Google Scholar Educational Objectives •Describe the mechanism of action for opioids •State the various opioid compounds and derivative medications •Define the basis for the placement of drugs into one of 5 schedules •Explain the pharmokinetics of opioid metabolism Earn up to 2 hours of CME credit per JHS issue when you read the related articles and take an online test. To pay the $20 fee and take this month's test, visit http://www.assh.org/professionals/jhs. •Describe the mechanism of action for opioids •State the various opioid compounds and derivative medications •Define the basis for the placement of drugs into one of 5 schedules •Explain the pharmokinetics of opioid metabolism Earn up to 2 hours of CME credit per JHS issue when you read the related articles and take an online test. To pay the $20 fee and take this month's test, visit http://www.assh.org/professionals/jhs.

Forest Conflict in Thailand: Northern Minorities in Focus

This paper aims at exploring the local background of and solutions to the forest conflict in upland areas inhabited by ethnic minorities, who are called hill tribes, in northern Thailand. A so-called hill tribe problem has been officially identified as a result of the slash-and-burn cultivation and other perceived problems, such as opium poppy cultivation, illegal immigration, and the suspicion of disloyalty to the state. This has created distrust and tension between the groups and authorities. The local conflict has recently been related to the dilemma of conserving the forest from all human interference, while many people live and make their livelihood within and adjacent to the protected areas. Furthermore, as the results imply, strictly protected areas and reforestation have also increased the competition over land and natural resources and, thereby, the likelihood of local conflicts. The scarcity and pollution of water, illegal logging, and poor fire control have contributed to the conflicts between local communities. The conflicts between the local communities and officials have been nourished by political and public discussions. Using definitions and terms with negative connotations and ignoring the heterogeneity between the groups or labeling some groups as malevolent have increased distrust and strengthened existing stereotypical images. Conflict resolution starts with efforts toward better mutual understanding, and changes in structures and attitudes are necessary. Local cooperation, utilization of traditional methods, and local institutions are central to conflict solving.

First Report of Pectobacterium carotovorum Causing Soft Rot of Opium Poppy in Spain.

Opium poppy (Papaver somniferum L.) is an economically important pharmaceutical crop in Spain. Approximately 8,000 ha are cultivated annually in southern and central Spain. To improve yields, opium poppy cultivation is expanding to more humid or irrigated areas of Spain. In the springs of 2005 and 2007, we observed poppy plants with wilt and stem rot symptoms in irrigated, commercial opium poppy (cv. Nigrum) at Carmona and Écija, which are in Seville Province in southern Spain. Closer observations of affected plants revealed darkening and water soaking of the leaves and stem at the soil level, wilting of the lower leaves or the entire plant, and dark brown discoloration of stem vascular tissues and pith of the plant. Severely affected plants became completely rotten and collapsed. Isolations from symptomatic tissues on nutrient agar consistently yielded bacterial colonies. Pure cultures of four representative bacterial strains (two per each of affected field and year of isolation) were used in triplicate for a comparative analysis of biochemical and physiological traits in the 'carotovora' group of Erwinia (1) with known isolates of Pectobacterium carotovorum subsp. carotovorum, P. carotovorum subsp. atrosepticum, and Dickeya chrysanthemi. The isolates from opium poppy were gram negative, facultatively anaerobic, oxidase negative, catalase positive, grew at 37°C, and did not produce gas from D-glucose. Acid was produced from D(+)-arabinose, lactose, and D(+)-trehalose, but not from α-D-methylglucoside. In addition, the opium poppy bacterial isolates caused soft rot on potato slices within 24 h at 25°C and did not induce a hypersensitive reaction on tobacco leaves. Use of the Biolog GN microplates and the OmniLog ID 1.2 system identified the four poppy isolates as P. carotovorum (showing a 66.7% similarity with the subsp. carotovorum). Pathogenicity of poppy isolates was tested on three 6-week-old opium poppy plants (cv. Nigrum) by injecting 100 μl of a bacterial suspension containing 108 CFU/ml in the basal stem. Plants that served as controls were injected with sterile water. Plants were incubated in a growth chamber adjusted to 28°C, 90% relative humidity, and a 14-h photoperiod of fluorescent light of 360 μE·m-2·s-1. Severe symptoms of soft rot and darkening developed on stems of inoculated plants within 3 to 5 days after inoculation. No symptoms developed on control plants. Bacterial strains reisolated from inoculated plants were identified as P. carotovorum on the basis of the Biolog system, as well as biochemical and physiological characters. To our knowledge, this is the first report of P. carotovorum causing soft rot of commercial opium poppy crops in Spain and elsewhere. The presence of this bacterial pathogen to irrigated crops and humid areas may pose an important constraint on the yield of opium poppy crops in Spain.

Kicking the opium habit?: Afghanistan's drug economy and politics since the 1980s

Four misconceptions plague the efforts of the Afghan government and the international community to succeeding in weaning Afghanistan off its narcotics economy. The first myth is that the explosion of opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan is a new phenomenon emerging from the fall of the Taliban. The second misconception is that if the Taliban regime had remained in power, given its religious fervour, it would have extirpated the illicit economy. The third misconception is that the warlords sponsoring the illicit economy gain only immense financial profits and weapons from the drug trade, a notion that critically ignores the significant political capital that they also reap from such involvement. The final myth and the most dangerous for efforts to cement progress in Afghanistan is that large-scale eradication of the opium crop is the quickest and most effective way to stabilize the country. Only massive economic investment in Afghanistan and wise patience not to demand immediate visible measures of ‘the success’ of counter-narcotics policies can produce a decrease in Afghanistan's illicit economy that it is truly durable and not politically destabilizing.

Where have all the flowers gone?: evaluation of the Taliban crackdown against opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan

This study presents what we believe to be the first formal evaluation of the Taliban crackdown against opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan. Afghanistan was the main source of the world's illicit heroin supply for most of the 1990s. From late 2000 and the year that followed, the Taliban enforced a ban on poppy farming via threats, forced eradication, and public punishment of transgressors. The result was a 99% reduction in the area of opium poppy farming in Taliban-controlled areas. The evaluation uses multiple comparison areas: the non-Taliban area of Afghanistan, neighbouring countries, the non-contiguous comparison area of Myanmar (Burma), and, the rest of the world. Alternative possible causes of the reduction such as drought, migration or changes in global opium markets are reviewed and excluded. It is concluded that the reduction in Afghan poppy cultivation was due to the enforcement action by the Taliban. Globally, the net result of the intervention produced an estimated 35% reduction in poppy cultivation and a 65% reduction in the potential illicit heroin supply from harvests in 2001. Though Afghan poppy growing returned to previous levels after the fall of the Taliban government, this may have been the most effective drug control action of modern times.

Why the Taliban poppy ban was very unlikely to have been sustained after a couple of years

Professors Farrell and Thorne (2005) have written an interesting paper that shows that the Taliban’s ban on opium poppy cultivation in 2000 resulted in dramatic declines of 90.8% in the number of hectares cultivated with poppy in Afghanistan 2002 to levels close to those of 2000. Farrell and Thorne do not pretend to draw conclusions about the possible sustainability of the poppy ban had the Taliban remained in power. There is no question that the Taliban’s ban on poppy was and 35% in the size of illegal poppy plantings in the world. Since the Taliban controlled area in Afghanistan had the highest opium yield per hectare, the declines in opium production were even larger: 94.3% in Afghanistan and 65.3% in the world! Farrell and Thorne, without praising or defending the Taliban, argue that “this may have been the most effective drug control action of modern times” achieved though a combination of “three principal techniques: the threat of punishment, the close local monitoring and eradication of continued poppy farming, plus the public punishment of transgressors”. The authors explore and reject alternative explanations to the poppy crop decline such as “a change in the global heroin market” and bad weather. They also present reasons why the Taliban decided to implement a ban on poppy plantings that emphasize the isolation that the Taliban regime was experiextraordinarily successful in 2001 and confirms that an extremely authoritarian government that has control over the territory can eliminate illicit crops. The authors’ arguments about the events leading to the ban are however based on a partial picture of what occurred in Afghanistan and present an overly positive view of what UNODC achieved. Following the convention used by Farrell and Thorne I use UNODC any time I refer to the United Nations office charged with drug control programmes, even though their acronym and functions have changed through time. I would like to argue that UNODC had less leverage on the Taliban than Farrell and Thorne believe, that a significant change in the world’s heroin market was an important event leading to the poppy ban, and that there are strong indications that the Taliban would not have been able to sustain the poppy ban. First, it is true that UNODC had established contacts with encing from the international community in 1998, the Muslim fundamentalist rejection of mind altering drugs and the Taliban’s assertion that the three year drought experienced by Afghanistan was God’s punishment for the peasants’ cultivation of poppy. Besides, the Taliban had been in contact w O h f c

Genetic engineering and biological weapons. New technologies, desires and threats from biological research.

Rapid developments in biotechnology, genetics and genomics are undoubtedly creating a variety of environmental, ethical, political and social challenges for advanced societies. But they also have severe implications for international peace and security because they open up tremendous avenues for the creation of new biological weapons. The genetically engineered ‘superbug’—highly lethal and resistant to environmental influence or any medical treatment—is only a small part of this story. Much more alarming, from an arms‐control perspective, are the possibilities of developing completely novel weapons on the basis of knowledge provided by biomedical research—developments that are already taking place. Such weapons, designed for new types of conflicts and warfare scenarios, secret operations or sabotage activities, are not mere science fiction, but are increasingly becoming a reality that we have to face. Here, we provide a systematic overview of the possible impact of biotechnology on the development of biological weapons. The history of biological warfare is nearly as old as the history of warfare itself. In ancient times, warring parties poisoned wells or used arrowheads with natural toxins. Mongol invaders catapulted plague victims into besieged cities, probably causing the first great plague epidemic in Europe, and British settlers distributed smallpox‐infected blankets to native Americans. Indeed, the insights into the nature of infectious diseases gained by Louis Pasteur and Robert Koch in the nineteenth century did not actually represent a great breakthrough in the use of infectious organisms as biological weapons. Similarly, the development of a bioweapon does not necessarily require genetic engineering—smallpox, plague and anthrax are deadly enough in their natural states. But the revolution in biotechnology, namely the new tools for analysing and specifically changing an organism's genetic material, has led to an increased risk of biowarfare due to several factors. First, the expansion of modern biotechnology in medical and pharmaceutical research and …

Drugs in Central Asia : Security Implications and Political Manipulations

The unprecedented growth of the drugs trade in Central Asia was facilitated by a combination of internal and external factors. A deteriorating socio-economic environment, weak state institutions, combined with record rates of opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan, helped create an environment attractive to criminal penetration. As a result of gaining a foothold in the region, the Central Asian drugs trade has subsequently been directly responsible for causing a greater degree of national and regional instability. In addition to threatening aspects of human security, drugs have also facilitated the rise of armed militants, and further deteriorated the ability of states to address their political and economic shortcomings. Furthermore, although the drugs trade has had serious implications on regional security, it may also be argued that national governments and external actors manipulate the drugs threat in an attempt to increase their influence and attain unrelated political and economic goals.

Drugs in Central Asia : Security implications and political manipulations

The unprecedented growth of the drugs trade in Central Asia was facilitated by a combination of internal and external factors. A deteriorating socio-economic environment, weak state institutions, combined with record rates of opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan, helped create an environment attractive to criminal penetration. As a result of gaining a foothold in the region, the Central Asian drugs trade has subsequently been directly responsible for causing a greater degree of national and regional instability. In addition to threatening aspects of human security, drugs have also facilitated the rise of armed militants, and further deteriorated the ability of states to address their political and economic shortcomings. Furthermore, although the drugs trade has had serious implications on regional security, it may also be argued that national governments and external actors manipulate the drugs threat in an attempt to increase their influence and attain unrelated political and economic goals. TM

Food plants from late bronze age lagoon sites in Languedoc, southern France: Reconstruction of farming economy and environment

During the late Bronze age, settlements in Languedoc, southern France, were located on the shore of lagoons lining the Mediterranean, while, in the hinterland, settlements were mainly in the form of villages or cave sites. Information on food plants has been restricted, until now, to sites in the hinterland. In this paper, the archaeobotanical results obtained from two lagoon-shore settlements, La Fangade at Sete, and Portal Vielh at Vendres, are reported. The former provides the first waterlogged assemblage for this period in the French Mediterranean while the latter consists of a dry settlement. Emmer and hulled, six row barley are the most common cereals occurring at the two sites. Other cereals are less frequent, although einkorn chaff is common at La Fangade. Flax, and especially opium poppy, are well represented while faba bean is the only pulse of some importance. Many wild fruits were gathered, especially acorns. Comparison with data from the hinterland suggests that the main difference lay in the cultivation of opium poppy and flax in the lagoon sites. However, may be largely an impression, resulting from the differences in manner of preservation at hinterland and lagoon sites. Local production as distinct from importation of crops is considered and the conclusion is drawn that, at least at La Fangade, hulled barley was grown locally. The arable weed flora indicates that sowing took place during both autumn and spring at La Fangade.

A Global Empirical Review of Drug Crop Eradication and United Nations' Crop Substitution and Alternative Development Strategies

Under international law, the cultivation of opium poppy, coca bush, and cannabis plant is allowed only for limited medical and scientific purposes. All other cultivation of these plants is marked for removal via eradication or other means, and strategies to implement these laws are reviewed. Globally, the annual risk of eradication is consistently below 10% for each crop. Evidence regarding socioeconomic development policies is taken from over two decades of United Nations programs in 11 countries. Using any measure of performance, they have had little impact. Even with marginal revisions in their methodology, the likelihood of these policies achieving their aims in the near future seems minimal.

A poppy survey using high resolution remote sensing data

The present study relates to the discrimination of opium poppy fields in northern Thailand using Landsat TM multispectral imageries. In several countries in Asia, a high priority is given to drug control policies and to the eradication of opium poppy cultivation. This is the case in Thailand, where the government is engaged in a permanent inventory of shifting cultivation practices in opium producing areas, especially in the Golden Triangle. The study area is included within 1 TM frame for which two dates are available, in 1993 and 1995. Both have been geometrically corrected in order to be superimposed. Various methods have been tested to enhance the imageries and to facilitate the visual interpretation. The imageries have been field checked both aerially and on the ground. The results are technically interesting for the detection and the eradication of these illicit crops. The discussion indicates the level of accuracy that may be obtained.

Opium Smoking in Late Imperial China: A Reconsideration

A social problem in one country may often be held up as an example to others, but it is rare for it to bring forth an internationally coordinated response with a world-wide application. One of these rarities is the campaign against ‘hard’ drugs. While liquor laws differ widely from country to country, the modern system of laws against cocaine and the opiates have been established by international convention. These arrangements evolved out of the measures taken to help imperial China with its opium problem, which was regarded, at least in part, as a foreign responsibility arising out of the vast quantities of Indian opium which had been imported by foreigners into China throughout the nineteenth century, often in questionable circumstances. The behaviour of the opium merchants and their governments seemed all the more reprehensible because of the encouragement which it gave to the Chinese to break their own government's laws against opium smoking and poppy cultivation. The first International Opium Commission met in Shanghai in 1909 and passed a number of resolutions to help China; it also laid down principles of co-operation between producing and consuming countries which tended logically to expand in scope and force, leading to a global system of control of all narcotic substances, and to the institutionalization of these arrangements under the League and the United Nations.

Development, Bureaucracy and Life on the Margins

Pacific ViewpointVolume 33, Issue 2 p. 159-164 ArticleFree Access Development, Bureaucracy and Life on the Margins Ken Kampe, Ken KampeSearch for more papers by this author Ken Kampe, Ken KampeSearch for more papers by this author First published: 01 May 1992 https://doi.org/10.1111/apv.332007Citations: 2AboutPDF ToolsExport citationAdd to favoritesTrack citation ShareShare Give accessShare full text accessShare full-text accessPlease review our Terms and Conditions of Use and check box below to share full-text version of article.I have read and accept the Wiley Online Library Terms and Conditions of UseShareable LinkUse the link below to share a full-text version of this article with your friends and colleagues. Learn more.Copy URL Share a linkShare onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditWechat References 1 Bhruksasri, W. et al. 1991. Heroin Addiction in Mon Ya Chiang Mai: Tribal Research Institute 2 Foundation of Education for Life and Society. 1990. Directory of Hill Tribe Development Organizations in Thailand Bangkok 3 McKinnon John and Bernard Vienne (eds). 1989. Hill Tribes Today Bangkok: White Lotus-Orstom 4 Ministry of Education. 1987. Survey of Hill Tribes and Minority Groups in Northern Thailand Bangkok 5 National Statistical Office. 1989. Summary of Population Census of Hill Tribes of Thailand Bangkok 6 UNDP/UNFDAC. 1989. Recommendations of the Second UNDP/UNFDAC Regional Seminar on Replacement of Opium Poppy Cultivation. Pakistan Citing Literature Volume33, Issue2May 1992Pages 159-164 ReferencesRelatedInformation

Some observations on the cultivation of opium poppy (Papaver somniferum L.) for its latex.

Some observations on the cultivation of opium poppy (Papaver somniferum L.) for its latex.