ABSTRACT

Opium use and cultivation have flourished in the northeast of Myanmar for at least 250 years. From the 1960s onwards, various state and non-state actors have resorted first to forced eradication, and more recently to ‘alternative development’ programmes to achieve opium suppression. There is no indication, however, that any of these strategies can effectively bring down opium cultivation, unless the structural factors that lead farmers to grow opium in the first place are directly confronted and addressed. The concept of ‘alternative development’ needs to be urgently redefined to challenge the dominant political and economic paradigms and place opium farmers at the forefront of this transformation.