Harvested to make Ecstasy, Cambodia's trees are felled one by one

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International drug trade drives illicit safrole-oil factories deep in the Cardamom mountains.

By Sam Campbell — Special to GlobalPost

Published: August 30, 2009 07:58 ET

PHNOM PENH, Cambodia — The pulse of dance-club music plays like a jungle beat, as thumping bass notes flirt with flashing lights, liquor and ecstasy of the pharmaceutical kind.

Miles and miles away, a little-known multi-billion dollar battle is playing out in the remote wilderness of Cambodia, linking the club scene to the jungle in a more nefarious way.

Clandestine factories deep in the Cardamom Mountains of western Cambodia are producing safrole oil — also known as sassafras oil — the main ingredient in the party drug Ecstasy.

The recreational drug produces a euphoria its users say is so good even yawning is unparalleled while under its influence. But this euphoria is not without its downside — and not just the toll it takes on the brain, which at least one animal study shows can still be detected seven years from the time of use.

There is a growing, and perhaps just as deadly, price being paid by the local environment. Trees containing the viscous, fragrant, safrole oil are felled during the manufacturing process. Their oil-rich roots are mechanically shredded and boiled in large cauldrons. The resulting mixture is then distilled over fires that require enormous quantities of firewood to fuel them. Safrole oil manufacturing is a big business, and as a result, severe deforestation and erosion scar the mountainous areas around the factories. The ramshackle, jury-rigged distilleries are perilous at best, and explosions are not unknown. Nearby streams that provide water for processing are soon fouled by factory waste, their delicate ecosystems poisoned. Even the oil itself is carcinogenic.

Though small-scale production of safrole oil for traditional remedies has been going on for centuries in Cambodia, the industrial production of oil destined for the narcotics trade has been ebbing and flowing since the late 1990s. In recent years, authorities have taken action against the safrole industry with some recent high-profile raids highlighting the issue.

A June 12, 2009 raid, led jointly by conservation NGO Fauna and Flora International and the Cambodian authorities, netted 142 barrels containing 5.7 tons of sassafras oil. Seized from a secluded house in the isolated village of O’ Kambou in the western Cardamom mountains, the haul could have produced 44 million tablets of Ecstasy with a total street value of $1.2 billion.

Most safrole oil distilleries are found in the Phnom Samkos Wildlife Sanctuary, which is located in the Cardamoms and is where the majority of oil-bearing trees remain, according to FFI.

Comments:

8 Comments.

Posted by Tom Blickman on September 2, 2009 05:58 ET

Eradication of unsustainable safrole-rich oil production only makes sense when viable and sustainable alternatives are in place. A more effective approach would be to involve all stakeholders: The people now implicated in the harvesting, who need to be educated on sustainable harvesting and distilling methods; the chemical industry, which needs to produce raw materials in a responsible, environmentally friendly way; academic institutes involved in developing alternative plants and harvesting methods; and development organizations to fund and design alternative development programs for environmentally friendly and sustainable production of safrole-rich oil. See: Harvesting Trees to Make Ecstasy Drug, The Irrawaddy, February 3, 2009 at http://www.irrawaddy.org/article.php?art_id=15050

Posted by jsinton on September 2, 2009 10:59 ET

So there's 78 to 137 metric tonnes a year, and 11 to 23 million users? What's wrong with this picture?

Posted by john ryan on September 2, 2009 12:53 ET

apparently you are unaware that a typical user can consume 100 ponds per year.Yes I would say that 2 pounds per week is about average, that is one of the reasons that it is such a bad drug.

Posted by xyzmn on September 2, 2009 23:16 ET

Your math is way off.

Lowest possible numbers using their math:
72,000,000,000 mg (72 metric tons) per year for 23 million users: 3130 MG per user per year.
If each pill is 125 mg (a realistic dose), that means each user (by their lowest estimates) MUST consume at least 25 pills per year, roughly meaning every MDMA user takes it AT LEAST bi-weekly or if they take 2 pills per use, every MDMA user takes it AT LEAST once a month, or maybe half of the users do it twice a month and the other half only do it every 1 month.

Am I the only one who does MDMA twice a year? Does that mean someone out there has to take it 23 MORE times per year than normal (50 times per year, or once a week, again, LOWEST estimates)? I'm of the persuasion that I'm the normal MDMA user and there's a lot of people like me. That means for every normal user, some fool is ruining his brain taking it once a week or more for every one of me there is? I just somehow doubt that.

There's no way with just 23 million users that drug dealers can offload 78 metric tons of MDMA in 1 year! Supply outstrips demand...

Posted by fr3nch on September 2, 2009 13:40 ET

Its really embarrassing how many people can't do simple math, let me help you. 1 metric ton=1000kg. so it 78000-137000 kg/year. Divided by 11-23million users. Average user consumed .006 - .0071 kg in a year. Call it an average of .0065 Kg. which is about 2.3 oz (weight). Go back to grade school please.

Posted by rvallee on September 3, 2009 10:38 ET

It seems only fair to thank the stubborn supporters of drug prohibition for this destruction. On top of subsidizing organized crime and paramilitaries to the tune of half a trillion a year and being responsible for the deaths of thousands of people each year, they are visibly responsible for the destruction of wildlife.

99.9% of all problems related to drug abuse are artificially created by its criminalization, despite the fact that prohibition has no credible effect on drug use.

Criminalize gambling and the mob will be running the casinos.

Criminalize fat and the mob will be running underground grease stands.

Thanks stubborn people for causing so much suffering and enriching criminal organisations without the slightest effect on drug use.

Posted by Latis on September 4, 2009 13:25 ET

And how will legalizing ecstacy stop the deforestation and environmental damage? I agree that prohibition causes problems, but mostly on the social side of the picture. Legalization will do almost nothing for environmental concerns. The trees are already endangered or at the very least threatened... legalizing the drug will not slow the demand.. and if you make the harvesting illegal or restricted you will still have illegal harvesting threatening the species.

The sad thing is people aren't going to care, if they want their high and or a night of recreational fun they aren't going to care or probably know about the longer reaching effects of their actions. And this is as true of drug users as it is of everyone (including myself) using electricity, computers, cars, drinking coffee, etc. We are all addicts to our comforts, and in the end we'll likely kill ourselves off because of the unsustainable changes we are making to our environment. Life will go on without us, but who knows what will set off a catastrophic series of changes that will make our species unviable. Probably not the Mreah prew phnom tree... but do we really know enough about the ecology to really be sure where the tipping points are globally?

Posted by YouAreLove on September 4, 2009 19:06 ET

We have abundant sources of safrole besides rain-forest trees! Safrole is contained in the leaves and bark of many plants, such as Sassafras, a fast-growing tree that is farmed in the US to produce safrole and other essential oils.

Details on sustainable harvesting of safrole from the Transnational Institute.

There is no global shortage of safrole, only artificial constraints caused by dangerously ill-conceived restrictions on "precursor" chemicals.

See the World Health Organization's Access to Controlled Medications Programme for examples of valuable medications that are unavailable in most of the world because they are also precursors for scheduled drugs, like ergometrine which is useful both for stopping bleeding after childbirth and for manufacturing LSD.

In 2003 the European Parliament's Committee on Citizens' Freedoms and Rights, Justice and Home Affairs recommended to repeal the UN 1988 Convention that restricts precursor chemicals.