The Washington Post reported that coca cultivation jumped 10% in Bolivia in 2019… partly because of reduced eradication efforts amid rising social and political conflicts.”
“Thierry Rostan, the agency’s representative in Bolivia, noted the expansion of coca fields in six of the country’s 22 national parks where a “significant degradation of ecosystems and the environment” was seen. The most affected park was Madidi National Park in the Bolivia’s Amazon."
A novel policy of “self-control” by coca growers implemented by Morales lost relevance in the last year of his government, when the coca voluntarilly eradicated was less than the increased area, Rostan said.
Morales, who led Bolivia’s largest coca-growers union, expelled the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration from the country in 2017 and nearly doubled the amount of legal coca destined for traditional uses to more 20,000 hectares…
“It is very likely that the area under coca cultivation will increase in the producing regions, due to lower levels of rationalization/eradication activities carried out for the control of surplus crops. These activities were temporarily suspended as of March 2020,” it said in the report.