Oftentimes these illegal activities run in parallel with legal commerce, complicating the singling out of those involved in illicit activities. This directly undermines the legal economy.
Real estate may be used for criminal activities, as a money laundering instrument, or to slowly generate streams of legal income. Moreover, drug money injects societies with cash used by criminals to gain foothold through buying up real estate. Compounding the existing problems is the fact that those with lower incomes tend to get addicted to illegal substances more easily. The various enabling factors such as infrastructure and local production leads to residents of poverty-stricken areas easily getting entangled in drug trade. Cocaine also disproportionately affects marginalised and vulnerable people. Zooming in on the cocaine trade, the sheer size of the industry (estimated total value of 9.068,96 million in 2017) impacts and undermines societies at large. Their infrastructure, connectivity, favourable laws, and the general commercial spirit additionally serve as a magnet for transnational drug trade. The two states play a pivotal role as a global hub for drug trade as both transit and export countries. Moreover, the Netherlands and Belgium are also home to the production of synthetic drugs such as ecstasy and speed which are exported across the globe. Through ingenious ways, cocaine started arriving in bulk and the business quickly began to grow exponentially. Fast-forward to today, the drug trade business is extremely well-organised, highly lucrative, and its focal point moved to Europe.įor transportation into Europe and beyond, Western European coastal regions form a crucial gateway for drug import and export. Through globalisation and subsequent increasingly transnational drug trade, the ‘War on Drugs’ internationalised. Starting in the 1970s, an assortment of policies was implemented with several main targets: warding off illegal drug production, supply, and consumption, as well as issuing treatment and increase prevention. The dominant approach of battling drugs as a public health issue and crime catalyst finds its roots in President Nixon’s America, with 2021 marking the 50 th anniversary of the ‘War on Drugs’. Despite counterefforts, the battle in its current shape and form is an unfeasible endeavour – but giving up is no alternative either. This uncontrollable and dangerous amalgamation of the criminal world and the legal society includes, but is definitely not limited to, investments in real estate subsequently used to generate a legal income stream, purchasing of bars, restaurants or sports clubs to launder money, corrupting and murdering of lawyers and notaries, and mass-scale tax evasion. Money earned in this lucrative business is increasingly invested (and laundered) in legal goods, services, and companies. The corollaries of contemporary drug trade undermine the very foundations on which our societies are built. A similar drug business which scourged Miami forty years ago (with visible aftershocks to this day) has now reached Europe’s shores. Although the United States has been the primary export market for cocaine, West European harbours are turning into a 1980s Miami. This so-called ‘War on Drugs’, is very much like the ‘War on Terror’ it is a costly, vast, and extraordinarily difficult undertaking. As a result of drugs impacting societies at large – with or without common conscience – governments have increased efforts to tackle organised criminal networks involved in drugs business.
Some are highly aware of this, others not at all.
In an age when the speed of information can often outstrip the speed of verification, the COVID-19 pandemic has taught us that it is crucial to cut through the noise and focus on facts, a lesson that we must heed in order to protect societies from the impact of drugs (UNODC, 2021)ĭrugs affect everybody, one way or another.
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