By: Chief Ezechukwu N Obonna
@ISSUP, ISAAC, WFAD.
Former SA On Narcotics And Illicit Drugs Monitoring
26th June is the United Nations Day Against drug Abuse and Illicit Trafficking. The Theme of this year’s exercise is:
” The evidence is clear: invest in prevention ”
In other to help advocate against the use and trafficking of Illicit drugs, there is great need for us to know the meaning and implications of certain forces that promote the circulation of Illicit substances. They include: Drug Supply, Source of drug supply, drug supply reduction and the implication of drug supply reduction.
What is Drug Supply ?
The definition of drug supply comprises: “ knowingly taking part in ” a wide range of activities involved in the distribution, provision and/or sale of prohibited drugs.
What Are The Five Sources Of Illicit Drug Supply?
The source of drug supply are numerous and everywhere. The unregistered drugs are supplied in commercial buses, motor parks, Beer parlors, hotels, club house, Pharmaceutical stores, supermarket as well as those who go about on foot selling these drugs.
What is drug supply reduction?
Drug supply reduction relates to the strengthening of national law enforcement agencies in their capacity to reduce and eventually eradicate drugs and related contraband.
Drug supply reduction can also be defined a any activity or program conducted by a National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) that is intended to reduce the availability or use of illegal drugs in Nigeria.
Supply reduction is one approach to social problems such as drug addiction . Other approaches are demand reduction and harm reduction.
Illegal drugs supply reduction efforts generally involves attempts to disrupt the manufacturing and distribution supply chains for these drugs, by both civilian law enforcement and sometimes military forces. This approach, sometimes characterized as the ” War on Drugs “, has been the dominant6 approach to drugs policy.
There is little or no evidence showing that supply reduction methods can be successful as a means to reduce the supply of illicit drugs. For example, the retail price of cocaine in Nigeria in 2007 was less than half the price in 1984, despite massive investments by the Nigerian government in supply reduction strategies. Some analysts have argued that the abject failure of supply reduction in Nigeria actually contributed to a significant and lasting reduction in crime and violence beginning in the 1990s, when cocaine prices hit record lows.
What Happens If You Reduce Supply?
In line with the laws of Demand and Supply, If supply increases while demand remains constant, price decreases. If supply decreases while demand remains constant, price increases
