According to data compiled by InsightCrime, Ecuador is the second country in the region with the most cocaine seizures. However, it is not possible to destroy all the drug.
The Police reported the seizure of 512 drug packages, on March 26, 2023, in Napo.
The amount of drugs that the authorities seize is one of the indicators of the level of penetration of drug trafficking in Ecuador. Between 2019 and 2022, the figure went from 88 to 201 tons. That is, it increased by 128%.
About 90% of these seizures are cocaine, according to data from the National Police.
InsightCrime, an organization specialized in organized crime, took stock of the seizures of this drug in Latin America, during 2022.
According to these data, Ecuador is the second country in the region that seizes the most cocaine. Last year, the Police seized 176 tons of this alkaloid.
Only Colombia exceeds that figure with 671 tons seized in 2022. While the third place on this list is Panama with 108 tons.
More is seized, more is trafficked
The most recent report from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (Unodc) ensures that the global supply of cocaine is at record levels: almost 2,000 tons were produced in 2020, continuing an upward trend that began in 2014.
Therefore, the increase in seizures does not necessarily mean a reduction in the number of narcotics that circulate evading controls.
There is no real and current calculation on the drugs that are seized versus those that circulate in and through Ecuador.
In 2022, the Anti-Narcotics Directorate of the National Police explained to PRIMICIAS that the drug that manages to cross the Ecuadorian borders and reach its destination would be 44% of what is sent.
In other words, if 176 tons of cocaine were seized that year, it could be inferred that some 134 tons were successfully trafficked from Ecuador.
“Seizure statistics indicate that large quantities of drugs continue to flow through traditional exit points, as well as some new ones,” InsightCrime concludes.
A transit country that surpasses the producers
For its analysis, InsightCrime divided the countries of the region into three:
- cocaine producers
- Traffic
- Secondary traffic.
The producers are Colombia, Peru and Bolivia.
Ecuador is located on the list of transit countries. And that means that Ecuador seized more cocaine than the two countries that produce the most cocaine, after Colombia.
Crisis Group, an organization dedicated to preventing armed conflicts, warned that the increase in the flow of drugs through Ecuador has brought with it an increase in violence.
This coincides with the thesis of the Government of Ecuador. The country’s homicide rate nearly double in 2022, for the second year in a row. The government attributes it to the war of the drug gangs.
seizure vs. destruction
Another problem that Ecuador has encountered, by increasing its drug seizure levels, is its subsequent destruction.
After the seizures, the Police do chemical tests to establish the type of drug and its degree of purity. The seized shipment is then weighed, and its provenance is recorded.
The drug goes to some warehouses of the Ministry of the Interior.
Finally, this State Portfolio must request a judicial order to proceed with the destruction that is carried out in furnaces of steel industries, cement factories or ceramic material.
According to figures from the Ministry of the Interior and the Police, between 2019 and March 2023, 673 tons of drugs have been seized, but only 537 tons have been destroyed.
That is, there is a balance of 135 tons.
Only in 2022, the Ministry of the Interior managed to seize more drugs than was seized. That is, he managed to reduce the balance.
