Andean Group - August 2026

The 2026 World Drug Report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), published on 25 June, showed that coca cultivation expanded in two of the world’s three leading producers from 2023-2024. Colombia remains by far the leading source of coca, with cultivation reaching another all-time high in 2024. In percentage terms, Bolivia saw the largest increase, although coca cultivation remains significantly lower than in Colombia and Peru. A more positive picture is emerging in Peru, where coca harvesting has declined for the third consecutive year.

Colombia unsurprisingly remains the epicentre of global coca cultivation, accounting for a record 261,000 hectares (ha) in 2024, up 3.3% from 252,600 ha in 2023. This was the fifth consecutive annual increase and continues a longer-term trend of expanding harvests. Over the past decade of UNODC figures, coca production has risen 278.3% from 69,000 ha in 2014. Aside from a drop from 2018-2020 under right-wing former president Iván Duque (2018-2022), coca cultivation has increased every year since 2013.

Former president Gustavo Petro (2022-2026), who was replaced by the far-right security hardliner Abelardo de la Espriella on 7 August, has been apportioned much of the blame for coca’s expansion in recent years, although in reality the surge began in 2021, the year before he took office, following a sharp drop in 2020 amid the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic. Nevertheless, between 2022, when Petro took office, and 2024 (the most recent year covered by the UNODC figures) coca harvests grew by a sizeable 13.5%.

• Aerial coca fumigation

  Colombia is poised for a major shift on coca policy under De la Espriella, who has pledged to bring back aerial fumigation of coca crops with glyphosate. This practice was suspended by the constitutional court in 2015 due to concerns about its impact on the environment and human health.

Petro’s reluctance to order the forceful eradication of coca crops, and to instead rely on voluntary crop substitutions amid peace talks with the armed groups that control the drug trade, is undoubtedly a factor in the growth of coca harvests during his presidency. The government halved its annual coca eradication target to 10,000 ha in March 2024, although this decision was reversed the following year after Pedro Sánchez took over as defence minister, replacing Iván Velásquez (2022-2025). Yet even the 30,000 ha eradication target imposed by Sánchez was 40% lower than the 50,000 ha target that Petro inherited from Duque.

This shift regarding coca eradication has had a major impact. According to the UNODC report, eradication reached a peak of 103,257 ha in 2021, under Duque, before falling by 90.9% over the following three years. Just 9,403 ha were eradicated in 2024, down from 20,325 in 2023 and 68,893 in 2022.

Peru sees sustained decline in coca harvest

In Peru, the UNODC figures show that 89,800 ha of land were dedicated to coca growing in 2024. This was down by 3.2% from 2023, and follows a 2.3% reduction that year from a peak of 95,000 ha in 2022. More recent figures, presented by the national anti-drugs agency (Devida) on 17 July, state that this trend continued in 2025, when cultivation fell 5.8% year-on-year to total 84,546 ha.

Devida’s report states that in 2025, coca production became more concentrated in the Apurímac, Ene, and Mantaro rivers valley (Vraem), the last stronghold of the Sendero Luminoso (SL) guerrilla group. The Vraem accounted for 42.8% of total coca cultivation in 2025, up from 40.5% in 2024. Despite accounting for by far the greatest share of national coca production, harvesting still fell in the Vraem by 0.4% year-on-year to total 36,196 ha. In Peru’s other main epicentre of coca production, the Inambari-Tambopata area of Madre de Dios region, production fell by 11.0% to total 9,349 ha. This accounted for 11.1% of the national total.

Meanwhile, eradication increased for the fifth consecutive year, totalling 36,456 ha in 2025. This was up by a significant 37.7% year-on-year. Eradication has risen every year since 2021 despite intense political churn that has seen six presidents hold office over that period. The new incumbent, President Keiko Fujimori, who took office on 28 July, is promising a hard line against crime and is likely to remain committed to eradication efforts. However, political priorities mean that her initial security policies may be more focused on urban crime, particularly extortion, which was a central focus of the recent election.

Despite this progress, the longer-term trend is of dramatic growth in coca harvesting. The UNODC figures show an increase of 109.3% in the decade since 2014, when cultivation stood at 42,900 ha.

Tougher measures likely in Bolivia

In Bolivia, the UNODC states that coca cultivation increased for the second consecutive year in 2024 to reach 34,000 ha. This was up by 9.7% on the 31,000 ha registered in 2023. Eradication, meanwhile, fell by 2.9% to 10,001 ha, down from 10,302.

President Rodrigo Paz, who took over from Luis Arce (2020-2025) in November last year, has vowed to bring coca cultivation back within the 22,000 ha limit that is allowed for traditional use. Paz’s first eight months in office have been mostly focused on economic priorities, rather than drug policy, although in a notable shift, in February the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) resumed activities in Bolivia for the first time since 2008, when it was expelled from the country by former president Evo Morales (2006-2019).

US security funds for Bolivia

On 17 June Bolivia’s foreign minister, Fernando Aramayo, and Debra Hevia, the then chief of mission at the US embassy in La Paz, signed a letter of agreement (LoA) to strengthen cooperation in the fight against drug trafficking and other transnational crimes. This will see the US contribute US$20m in security assistance, consisting of training and equipment.