Cocaine Capital of the World Stacey Dooley Investigates

All over the world,

hundreds of thousands of people are fighting a hidden war.

So what's happening up there? What's going on?

The outcome of which could affect us all.

It's the war against drugs.

In this series,

I'll travel to the front line of this conflict.

In Thailand, I'll investigate how a new drug

is devastating the local population,

and is even being taken by kids.

But tonight, I'll be journeying to a country

that's now replaced Colombia

as the world's number-one coca producer -

Peru.

Oh, this is it.

Coca, see?

I'll discover how easy it is for cocaine traffickers

to set up production deep in the jungle.

So, this is it - one step closer to being the cocaine we know at home.

I'll hear about the brutal violence carried out by drug cartels

on those that cross them.

I'll join government forces as they launch a new war

to try and destroy this multi-million-dollar industry.

Oh, my gosh, look at that!

But will the authorities' fightback be enough

to win control of the world's cocaine capital?

My journey begins in Peru's vibrant capital city - Lima.

Most Brits come here for the sun, seafood and pisco sours,

but now, more and more are coming for the cocaine.

Lima's crime-ridden port district

is home to the notorious Sarita Colonia prison.

I've come to the prison here, in Lima,

and I've arranged to meet a British drug mule.

So, this guy got caught trying to smuggle a huge amount of cocaine

back into Europe, and he's now found himself serving a long time inside.

Hola.

Peru now has more foreigners locked up for drug trafficking offences

than any other South American country.

And some of them are from surprisingly close to home.

-Hello.

-Danny.

-How are you, Danny?

-I'm not too bad.

-I'm Stacey.

Where are you from? Whereabouts?

Inglaterra. Originally near Southend.

-Yeah? I'm from Luton.

-Luton!

-You know it?

-Oh, I know Luton well.

Look at you with your England cap on!

You've got to represent your country.

Lima's high-security prison was built for just 570 prisoners...

Oh, it's busy, isn't it?

..but now, there are over 2,800 men living here,

almost all of them for drug trafficking offences.

How many Brits are there in here?

-11 or 12 of us.

-OK.

Danny is two years into a six-year sentence.

He was trying to make a fast buck, smuggling cocaine to Europe,

but got caught at Lima airport with 1.3 kilos of the drug.

How much were you offered?

I was offered 5,000 for coming and doing it

and then anything over the one kilo was mine to take and sell

or do whatever I wanted to do with afterwards.

In total, I could have probably made...

I don't know, close to 20,000.

So your job was to just get on the plane, come to Peru...

Yeah, literally, they gave me the ticket to come here,

spending money while I was here.

You'll get told to go to a bar on a certain day at a certain time.

You meet someone, they hand you a suitcase

and that's the suitcase you just...

When you finish your holiday, four days later or whatever it is,

that's the suitcase you just go to the airport with to fly home.

-But...

-It didn't work out that way.

No. You get your plane ticket, you go to turn around,

I got about three steps away, hand on the shoulder...

Yeah, and they're like, "Oh, you know,

"can we search your suitcase?"

-And at that point, you're thinking, "Oh..."

-You feel sick?

Yeah, yeah, the whole stomach just drops. You think, "Uff!"

Your head's just spinning, you don't know what to expect.

Pretty much, though, you do know that your life's over.

Big, big regret in life.

Why Peru? Why did you come to Peru?

At the time, that's where they said to go.

I mean, I never knew Peru was the biggest drug, sort of, producer.

You know, if anyone ever said to me, "Where does cocaine come from?"

-Colombia.

-Me too.

-Even I had to look it up, whereabouts...

-On the map?

..in South America am I going?

Thank you very much. Bye.

You know, I'm really taken aback, actually.

There's 12 Brits currently serving time in here

because a cocaine deal has gone wrong.

It's not quite worked out. They wanted quick money,

they've got caught and they're now paying the price.

So, yeah, Peru, seemingly, is the place to be if you want the cocaine.

Peru is the new Colombia.

I'm heading off on a journey

to find out why the Peruvian cocaine industry is now booming.

First, I want to see for myself how the drug is actually made.

I've come to the coca growing capital of Peru - the VRAE valley.

Tens of thousands of hectares of coca is grown here -

around a third of what's grown in the whole of Peru.

The first essential ingredient in the cocaine-making process

is the coca leaf itself,

grown in the nutrient-rich soil in the Peruvian mountains.

Right now, I'm heading into the hills of San Jose

and I'm told that once I get up there,

the coca plantations that I'll see are absolutely huge.

They're massive.

But as I was about to discover,

just getting around this country was going to be a nightmare.

Yes, Alex! You are gangster!

Ooh, ah...

Shoot.

It looks like the road has just come away.

Brilliant.

Alex, how am I going to get across that?

-No.

-No, no, no.

Just when I thought the roads had beaten us,

a car full of guys turned up

and they quickly went to work rebuilding the bridge.

Alex?

Oh, oh, oh!

Ah!

Dale, dale! Dale, dale, dale!

-DOG BARKS

-Whoo! Yeah!

Back on the road, but not for long.

Ugh!

This roadblock was not for shifting.

Ugh!

I'm just not sure how we're going to be able to continue.

It's...looking impossible.

When trying to get to the top of a Peruvian mountain,

four legs are most definitely better than two.

Are you going to be nice?

-Oh, his name's Charlie! His name's Charlie?

-Yeah.

SHE SQUEALS

Charlie, come on! Come on, Charlie, get a wiggle on.

It's the perfect name, no?! Charlie.

Take me to the Charlie, Charlie.

If it's this hard for me to get to the coca plantations,

it must be a real headache for the Peruvian authorities to police.

Keep going.

-Come on, Charlie!

-BRAYING

Oh, Charlie!

When I finally reached the plateau, I couldn't quite believe my eyes.

There's a hell of a lot of coca.

I mean, it's literally everywhere you look.

Bit blown away.

From the very top of that hill,

it comes all the way down, all across here,

right down to the very bottom.

It's just all coca, the whole lot of it.

And this is just a tiny drop in the ocean

in comparison to what really exists here.

I mean, there's every chance

that the cocaine produced out of these coca leaves

will end up in the UK.

I mean, Peru caters for Europe mostly,

it sends most of the cocaine to Europe,

and so a lot of it will end up in our big towns and big cities.

Could well have come from here.

Maybe this exact valley.

What do you reckon, Charlie?

The sheer quantity of coca plants needed makes it impossible to hide.

But the further along the cocaine trail you get,

the greater the penalties if caught,

so the next stage of the process -

extracting the essential chemicals from the leaf -

is done in cocaine laboratories hidden in the jungle.

To see that meant entering a town where we would not be very welcome.

So, this morning, I'm heading to a town called Santa Rosa,

and Santa Rosa is infamous, it's very, very well known

for producing cocaine on an industrial scale.

It's a bit of a lawless community, to be honest.

And, you know, the thought of westerners going into Santa Rosa fills them with fear.

Like, they don't want us there.

They worry about informers, they worry about the drug cartels

and they worry about what we're going to see,

so we have to keep an incredibly low profile today.

There's no way on Earth we can get the big camera out.

We can't be seen to be filming.

We had arranged to meet our contact in Santa Rosa,

who had agreed to show us the next stage of the process.

So, we've just entered Santa Rosa now.

It does feel very tense here...

..and I think we're just going to try and see as much as we can

and get the hell out of here.

Our contact was becoming concerned that he might be spotted

showing a western TV crew their illegal trade,

and the local drug cartels might find out,

so we were told to wait in a back street

until he was confident the route was clear.

When the call finally came through, we had to move quickly.

Our only opportunity was fast running out.

Everything feels quite panicked, everything feels quite rushed.

Hola, senor.

-Baja rapido, rapido.

-Quick, quick.

On arrival, we were ushered quickly into the jungle.

Our contact seemed nervous.

He was scared other people in the jungle might tell the drug cartels

that we were here.

-SHE WHISPERS:

-This is crazy.

We're having to hide here now because he thinks...

..there's people around us who could be listening.

Finally, I arrived at the cocaine laboratory.

-SHE WHISPERS:

-Here it is, this is the lab.

He then showed me some of the toxic chemicals

that are used to make cocaine.

-Salt? Just regular salt?

-Mm-hm.

I was surprised at how simple and makeshift the whole operation was.

-Can I have a look? Am I able to come in?

-Si, si, si.

-OK.

So this is it - this is the next stage,

one step closer to being the cocaine we know at home.

It stinks, though. It really, really smells. The smell is so strong.

You see all this water that's come out,

it almost looks like juice?

That's what they need to make the cocaine.

It's not the leaf, it's what's inside the leaf.

Vamos a seguir el trabajo batiendo.

The coca leaves release the chemical cocaine hydrochloride,

which is then skimmed from the surface of the liquid.

It stinks.

Ammonia?

Then, more chemicals are added.

SHE CLEARS HER THROAT

SHE COUGHS

Este es el material de cal.

Are the police on to you guys, do they know that you do this?

You can see already it's starting to resemble cocaine a bit more.

This guy had been making cocaine this way for over 14 years,

so I was shocked to hear what he thought the drug was being used for.

Do you think about the implications that your work has around the world?

To hear him tell me what he genuinely believes

this cocaine will be used for is just astonishing.

You know, he said, "Well, of course I know what it's used for.

"They give it to the soldiers so that they're not scared to go into war."

And I just thought, "Ooh!"

These guys really have no idea about where this coke can end up.

I've seen people become addicted to coke at home,

I've seen how it can destroy people's lives

and the thought that he has no idea

that that's even an issue is mind-blowing.

Having seen the huge scale of cocaine production

and the vast swathes of coca plantations,

I wanted to find out what the Peruvian authorities were doing

to fight this growing threat.

I'm on my way to the police base here in Tingo Maria,

to join the anti-narcotics police on a raid.

So they've discovered there's this cocaine laboratory,

it's hidden somewhere nearby in the jungle

and they've agreed that I can come along.

The anti-narcotics police were unpacking a lorry-load of bananas

they had just confiscated after a tip-off.

And there it was - another crop hidden underneath.

You can see it - coca, coca, coca, coca.

When I joined the Commandant and his team,

they were already in the operations briefing.

The plan was to raid a mixing pool in the jungle

a few kilometres north of here,

seize the laboratory and apprehend any workers.

They're geared up to the eyeballs,

I can't tell you how many guns and weapons and bullets and...

I mean, look at this lad here.

Ooh, here we go.

Comandante, the laboratory that we're going to go and see now,

are there cartels there?

The Shining Path are a leftist guerrilla group

who provide the muscle for the drug cartels.

-RADIO:

-Haciendo cobertura, primer puente.

Suddenly, our convoy drew to a halt.

So, what's happening up there? What's going on?

While it's crucial they're cautious,

it's also a race to reach the mixing pool in time

to catch the cocaine producers in the act.

Once we arrived, the anti-narcotics police leapt into action.

Go, go, go, go!

Si.

Si, si, si.

A heavily-armed team went on ahead to secure the area.

Rio arriba.

Oh!

I've never experienced anything like this.

The heat and the danger is the most full-on thing.

This is the maddest thing I've ever done.

It's relentless.

It's just the most insane thing I've ever... Oh!

This is it. We're here. This is it.

It's exactly like the one I saw in VRAE.

And a second lab was discovered a bit further into the jungle.

Acido sulfurico, que mas?

All the tools and ingredients to make coca paste

were lying around the lab,

as if they had been hastily abandoned.

Did you find anyone working here?

But, I mean, today, you found two mixing pools,

but there'll be no prosecution. A bit disheartening.

Ya vamos a quemar esto, jefe!

The workers had all escaped

and would likely just set up a new mixing pool somewhere else.

It seemed to me this was a game of cat and mouse

that the authorities were losing.

All the Commandant and his men could do now was burn the place down.

If they could get it to light, that is.

These guys are just trying to burn the mixing pool down now,

but they're struggling cos the rain's come.

Someone threw gasolina all over the floor,

so it's now going to trickle right through,

so this is going to go up big.

Oh, my gosh! Look at that!

Ooh!

I mean, I guess today was a success for the police, in a sense.

They've busted two labs, so they've got to be happy with that...

..but they didn't catch anyone.

You know, they said they feel like

perhaps they didn't catch the guys in action

because they were informed.

Perhaps someone in the town rang them and went,

"We've just seen the police drive past."

So it sounds like a lot of the town and a lot of the communities still

sort of have that pack mentality

when it comes to protecting the coca.

I wanted to see the final stage of the cocaine-making process,

where the paste from the mixing pool is turned into pure cocaine...

..but it was proving difficult to find someone willing to show me.

Eventually, we got lucky.

After a lot of persuasion, a couple of guys have agreed

to show me this final stage of the production process.

I'm told ordinarily it will happen in sort of big, hidden laboratories

and they're spread around the town.

They're not willing to take me to one of them,

but they have said they agree to meet me at another location.

-Hola.

-Queria decirle que no nos tomeis la cara.

-No camera.

-Ya, de aca para abajo.

OK, his face down. Si.

This was just a small demonstration.

These guys work in one of the many huge cocaine-cooking laboratories

scattered around Santa Rosa.

The cocaine paste is still full of chemicals,

which need to be drained from the solids.

Well, you can see it all spilling out there.

What happens next?

He then pops the drained cocaine paste into the microwave

and set it to full power.

I was astonished at how easy it had been to produce pure cocaine

and with such basic equipment.

That's it, finished now. It's ready to...ready to snort?

I wanted to know who would then buy the finished cocaine,

but he was keeping well schtum.

Where will the cocaine go next? Who will take it off you?

Peru's cocaine production is so adaptable and well hidden

that it's proving to be very difficult

for the authorities to keep a lid on.

And now there's a new problem emerging

in an even more difficult-to-police part of Peru.

Rapido! Rapido!

Coca production is now starting to appear

in places it's never been grown before -

in the Amazon basin.

To get to these coca plantations,

I had to catch a jungle plane,

which was supposed to be leaving about now.

I'm going nowhere fast.

I'm waiting for my plane, aren't I?

I'm wanting to go to Caballococha.

That's where all the coca plantations are,

a lot of them are based there.

But, as you can see, shock horror, Sod's law,

I thought it'd be wise to come in the rainy season,

and I've been stopped in my tracks.

-Just waiting, aren't we?

-SHE LAUGHS

Just chilling in a jungle airport.

Here, come...

It's not dissimilar to Terminal 5.

My main worry is the flight itself.

There aren't many planes that fly to this remote part of the jungle,

and it looks as if they ram them as full as they can.

I've only been on a couple of these small planes in my whole life

and I'm not a mad fan, like, they're so bouncy,

you can feel every little bit of turbulence in them.

Oh...

Wish me luck.

Once we were above the clouds, my nerves soon disappear.

This is amazing.

It feels like we're in the middle of nowhere.

It feels like we're in no-man's-land.

Coca has traditionally been grown on mountainsides,

with its dry, nutrient-rich soil.

But a new strain of coca plant has been developed,

which means it can now be grown

in places it's never been grown before.

There's meant to be a great deal of coca plantations all over this area.

This new strain of coca leaf has transformed this Amazonian region,

close to the Colombian border,

making it Peru's fastest-growing area of new coca production.

-SHE LAUGHS

-Is this the terminal?

MUSIC PLAYS

SHE LAUGHS

Are you winding me up? Is this the terminal?

So, this is the main terminal. This is where it's at.

It gives you some kind of idea just how remote I am.

This is it, the whole airport.

-There's an engine on the floor!

-SHE LAUGHS

Oh! This is ridiculous.

Being so close to Colombia means Colombian drug cartels

have moved into Peru's Amazon region,

staking a claim to this territory.

It's believed they brought the new strain of coca plant with them.

So, right now, I'm very, very close to the border.

I'm literally sat between Peru and Colombia.

You can see Colombia in the distance.

And I've arranged to go and meet a pastor

who used to live around this area

who has agreed to talk to me and explain to me

what life has been like since the Colombian narco-traffickers arrived.

Hola, como estas?

Bien, mi nombre es Pastor Marco Vela Ramirez.

Pastor Marco was the religious leader of a small peaceful community

living on the Peruvian side of the river

until the drug traffickers turned up.

They're nearby right now?

The traffickers were friendly at first,

offering work on the coca plantations.

But when an internal feud over territory split the cartel in two,

the pastor's community found themselves

on the wrong side of the divide.

Is it still that dangerous here now?

And where are the police, the Peruvian Police?

It's so remote that the state has almost no presence here,

leaving communities at the mercy of the drug cartels.

My journey took me deeper into this lawless cocaine country.

Hola! Please don't kill me.

I had arranged to spend some time with a coca farming community,

in a village called Cushillococha.

Most of the communities I'd seen so far

appeared to be living very poor lives

in small shacks on the river bank, barely surviving.

I mean, look at this, look at this home.

I guess a lot of the families that are living in these really simple shacks

are just living a hand-to-mouth existence.

It's such a simple way of life.

We're approaching, right now, Cushillococha.

I mean, already, it looks really very different to the shacks

that I've seen coming down to the river.

You can see the roofs.

So, if you have a look here, the roofs are tin

as opposed to the leaves that we've been used to seeing.

There's bricks - I've not seen a home with bricks

since I've been here.

Certainly, a lot more money floating around here.

I'm mean, it's central London, innit?

Hola, amigo.

Town leader Antolin was there to meet me...

Como estas? Bien?

..along with an unlikely-looking chap,

who said he was the mayor.

-Hola!

-Mucho gusto.

-Como estas?

-Bien.

Oh, you're the mayor!

Nice to meet you. Thank you for having me.

"Welcome to Cushillococha."

Hola.

Immediately, it just looks so different, no?

The contrast to the home that I saw down the river is absolutely huge.

Look, one, two, three homes sat there side by side

and they all look like they've just been finished.

So they've got the exposed bricks...

One, two, three...

There's four satellite dishes.

Next door's got a satellite and a tin roof.

There's tin roofs everywhere.

So if you just have a look at this home -

this is what would have been the older home, I'm assuming,

and then, look, they've built almost an extension.

The extension's got a tin roof and there's a satellite dish.

This is more traditional.

Hola.

So what is it that you do for a living

and how have you been able to make improvements to your home?

So the only reason you've ever tasted cold water

is because you had enough money from the coca production to buy a fridge?

Si.

The profits from growing this new strain of coca leaf

has had a transformational effect on this community.

-These bikes are new?

-Uh-huh.

As town leader, Antolin explained.

Is it not a massive risk and a massive worry for you and the community

having to deal with drug traffickers?

I guess this is a really complicated scenario. You know,

being involved in any type of cocaine production is illegal.

With that comes so many risks, as well.

You know, these people are having to deal with people

who are not very nice people, who are not mucking about,

who are hardened drug cartels.

I don't know how you decide what's best for you and your family.

How do you make that kind of call?

One coca farmer and his family kindly agreed to let me visit them

and join them on a harvest of their coca plantation,

which was hidden somewhere in the nearby jungle.

Oh, gracias!

Hello, hola!

Oh, God, there's so many!

You have five children!

Hello, Mum. How are you?

I'm Stacey.

-Hola! Como estas?

-Buenas tardes.

Get yourself decent! The telly's here!

How are you, sir?

My English name is Stacey Dooley.

-THEY LAUGH

-It's funny, isn't it?

Bienvenidos a Cushillococha! Pasad, adelante!

While their neighbours have been growing the new strain of coca leaf

for the last five years,

Shuca and Eva refused to grow the drug.

But this year, they have finally succumbed,

having seen the financial benefits their neighbours have enjoyed.

Sounds like it was a difficult choice

for you to agree to producing coca - why?

Put your welly on.

It was time to go to work at the coca plantation...

Off to watch Mum and Dad work.

..and that meant a full-on family affair.

It clearly means an awful lot to this family

to own their own coca plantation.

For them, the arrival of coca in this region has been a blessing.

Deeper we went into the flooded forest,

through a route that Shuca had shared with few others.

I was keen to finally see this new strain of coca plant,

which was bringing so much change to this part of Peru.

But there were a few jungle obstacles to overcome first.

Oh! I can't get my foot out.

Oh!

I might be all right.

Whoa!

I'm not a very good swimmer.

Listo. Estamos en el otro lado ya.

SHE SCREAMS

Oh, is this us?

We've arrived! Oh, this is it.

This is the coca plantation.

Right away, Shuca and his family start harvesting the crop.

This is it. This is the Amazonian coca leaf.

It just looks so inconspicuous and just so useless, no?

Amazonian coca leaf is believed

to have been specially cultivated by Colombian drug cartels

in order to expand their production

by growing the crop in previously inhospitable conditions.

This has been designed, almost, it's been made

so that it can flourish in this kind of environment.

So, traditionally, you'd grow coca leaves up in mountains.

This leaf can be grown in an environment

that's like a flooded swamp.

What do we think you would get for one harvest?

How much would you make?

You harvest three times a year,

so you're earning about £600 extra a year for you and your family.

Si, si, si, si.

£600 is a lot of money to Shuca and his family,

when they were previously earning next to nothing.

It left me feeling a bit divided.

I personally have seen cocaine do so many awful things,

but, equally, I can't argue that, seemingly,

it's helping Peruvian families in some weird way.

You know, they're able to pay their lecky bills,

they're able to pay their water bills,

feed their kids and send their kids to school

because these leaves are in such high demand.

This is having a massive impact...

..on the Amazonian part of Peru.

What I've seen here has frightening potential.

The toxic combination of this new strain of coca,

along with hundreds and thousands of poor people with nothing to lose,

could prompt a further boom to the cocaine industry.

The authorities clearly need a serious plan

to deal with the escalation of coca production

and tackle this growing threat.

The Peruvian government now believes it does have an answer.

I've joined CORAH.

They're the government brigade that's been tasked

with eradicating Peru's illegal coca plantations...

..using force, if necessary.

Miguel is operations director

and oversees the government's coca eradication programme.

Coca. Coca, see?

For the first time ever,

the Peruvian government is providing its own funding

to combat the cocaine industry,

rather than relying on US and European Union aid.

-One minute.

-One minute. One minute.

Uno momento!

This year, CORAH have a 26 million budget

and their coca eradication targets have more than doubled.

Up in the air, you get the gist of how massive the problem is

and how big a job these guys have got.

It's a job that must feel like it's never going to end.

Everywhere you look - coca, coca, coca.

Once the coca plantations have been spotted and recorded from the air,

CORAH sends in its brigade to start the eradication.

So I'm assuming the idea is for your guys to just get rid

of all the coca in this area.

As Miguel's men were clearing the plantation,

my thoughts turned to the farmers who rely on this crop.

How do the coca farmers react, you know,

when you're coming in and effectively taking their livelihood?

I totally get that none of that behaviour is acceptable,

and you guys are just trying to do a good job.

But, sometimes, can you sympathise with people doing desperate things?

Because they're thinking, "Ah, this is the only way I can get money,

"this is the only way I can feed my kids."

I knew the violent actions of the coca farmers were not right,

but I wondered how Shuca, the coca farmer that I'd met, would have reacted

if it was his plantation being eradicated.

When I came up here and I saw the guys ripping all the coca out,

the first thing you think is, "Thank God this isn't Shuca's,"

because he'd be mortified,

his kids would be mortified, his wife would be gutted.

I mean, it would seriously ruin their life.

But this is somebody's plantation

and it will have been feeding some family

and it will have been helping financially in some way.

But on the flip side, it then goes on to make this horrible product

that can ruin loads of lives,

so...who's right and who's wrong?

It's...it's hard.

Then, before the team could complete their work,

we were suddenly under attack.

Not from angry farmers or the drug cartels,

but from a swarm of bees.

SHE MOANS

-Levantese, levantese mas su...

-There's a swarm of bees.

I can't see anything. Where are the bees?

Oh, shit.

There was no standing our ground.

This is ridic... Ugh!

We had to beat a full retreat until the bees settled.

It's a constant battle up here.

Narco-traffickers, Colombians, cartels, bees.

SHE SIGHS

It seems to me that eradication alone will never work.

They can rip the coca plants out of the ground all they want,

but so long as there's hundreds and thousands of poor people here,

there will always be the temptation to regrow it.

Before I left, I wanted to see if the Peruvian government

were offering these coca-growing communities

any alternative ways to make a living.

Muchas gracias. It's not nice out there.

OK, I've come to see a government organisation called DEVIDA,

so it's their job to go in after a coca eradication

and they've got to try and convince the communities

to start growing other, legal crops, you know, alternative crops.

That sounds like it'll be a pretty tough sell.

I'm Stacey.

Nice to meet you both.

Crucially, DEVIDA are offering communities an all-round package...

..including legal crops with access to markets

and road and bridge-building projects -

something these remote communities badly need.

We were heading to a small town called Inti,

where there'd been a tight-knit community of coca growers,

until, of course, the eradication teams arrived

and cleared all the coca.

Jesus is here to speak to the villagers

for the first time since then.

The town seemed pretty empty,

apart from the animals

and a few people by the village shop.

-Hola, como estas?

-Hola!

-Seno, como estas? Buenas.

-Hola, como estas, senorita?

-Senorita!

When I delved a little deeper,

it became apparent why this woman was so resentful of the government.

When was your plantation eradicated?

When did that happen?

So, how has that been able to happen?

This lady has had her coca taken away six months ago -

half a year ago -

and this is the first time she's saying anyone's offered any help.

The government clearly has a difficult job on its hands,

but I can't help feeling that something more needs to be done.

It's madness to me

that they've come and eradicated this woman's coca plantation.

She's been hungry for six months

and this is the first contact that's been made.

I mean, from my understanding,

the organisation set out to try and win the communities over,

you know, to get them onside and help them rebuild their lives

that have been devastated because their coca's been taken away,

but it doesn't really seem like that's happening, does it?

Yes, the eradication needs to happen but these people need to be given

an alternative way to make a living a lot quicker.

Just as we were about to leave, I noticed something going on

a couple of houses along from the old lady's shop.

I couldn't quite believe what I was seeing.

-SHE CHUCKLES

-There's so much coca here.

This is a community that's supposed

to have been completely eradicated, you know,

they're meant to have sorted it. Tick, done.

And I've literally walked around the corner

and there's coca everywhere.

You know, in a way, what do the government

and what do the authorities expect?

They've left this community for six months,

so the people have taken it upon themselves to think,

"We haven't got any way of making money.

"We're going to have to go back to coca."

And that's what's happened.

But it seems like, as long as there's demand,

as long as people are desperate for coke,

this will always be an issue.

You know, it's almost unstoppable, it can't be fixed.

This is a problem that can't be mended.

I've no doubt the Peruvian authorities are making

a really serious attempt to fight the cocaine industry.

But it seems to me that the sheer scale of the problem

far outweighs the resources available to fight it.

And as long as there are so may poor communities

for which cocaine is a route out of poverty,

my fear is that Peru will remain the world's number one coca producer

for many years to come.

Next time, I'll be in Thailand

investigating how a new drug epidemic

is sweeping through the country...

Is this the first time

that you've seen him pull out a gun and act this crazy?

..even affecting kids.

There's now 12-year-olds

clucking and addicted to yaba in Thailand.