Bringing drugs into light: embedded governance and opium production in Myanmar’s Shan State

Paradoxical issues in eradicating opium cultivation in Myanmar: A perspective from local farmers’ voices

“…Besides that, excellent quality poppy yields should be named “special opium cultivating areas.” They should be further examined and tested carefully its related qualities before possibly meeting international demand for essential medicines, such as in India, France and Australia (Gibson et al, 2005; Paoli et al, 2008). To achieve this, the government can control the size and quality of poppy‐growing and create a more harmonious balance of the relationship between supply reduction and local growers (Lim & Kim, 2021). Thus, in 2019, a request was made to the government that they end punitive approaches and stop treating poppy farmers as criminals.…”

“…Firstly, banning opium cultivation and responding to poverty reduction should follow evidence‐based approaches to confirm the effective measures of opium eradication. As one of the embedded governance approaches, perhaps “instead of criminalizing opium cultivation, opium production should be considered a basis for political and economic exchanges, which either unites or divides relevant stakeholders” (Lim & Kim, 2021 p. 105). Secondly, recognizing the full land rights rather than requesting land‐use certificates (LUCs) on their ancestry‐and‐customary properties is necessary to secure with the farmers to avoid the escalating ethnic conflicts.…”

“…Even though, there has been no modification with the new regime since the military coup in February 2021 (Lintner, 2021). The government should offer long‐term dealings that focus on community safety, public health, human rights, and AD (Jelsma, 2018b; Lim & Kim, 2021; Meehan, 2021).…”

“…Lastly, I am indebted to the PPP editorial board and anonymous peer reviewers for their helpful recommendations through the revision and publication process. 2 Within the scope of this paper, I only argue core paradoxes based on poppy farmer's voices extracted from MOFF's statements combined with my observations in the fieldwork rather than using the theory of "embedded governance" (Lim & Kim, 2021) and "development-oriented drug policies" (Meehan, 2021) to explain the nature of the political economy of eradicating opium. For more detailed information and analysis of the political economy of opium reduction in Myanmar see Lone & Cachia (2021) and Kramer (2021) and/or clarify this volume under the current Myanmar drug laws.…”