# How come you never hear of "home grown" cocaine?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [March 27, 2002, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391 "2002-03-27T16:09:37Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\
**Post date:** [March 29, 2002, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-come-you-never-hear-of-home-grown-cocaine/100391/41 "2002-03-29T15:18:45Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by KidCharlemagne \*  
> \*\*Duck Duck,  
> Im not sure about your numbers but im assuming that’s a pretty huge operation - like cartel size. Someone said you need 1000 lbs of coca leaves to make 2 lbs of cocaine. Id be curious to know how many coca plants you;d need to yield that. And what the growing time on a tree to produce x amount of leaves be. \*\*

Here is the source

1000-2 is the conservative range -1000-3 is the less coinservative range.

[United Nations General Assembly  
Special Session on the World Drug Problem](http://www.un.org/ga/20special/presskit/pubinfo/info2.htm)

New York, 8-10 June 1998 - KEY STATISTICS: ILLICIT DRUG PRODUCTION, TRAFFICKING AND CONSUMPTION - A. Production

> [@](#):
>
> Applying the most conservative conversion ratios (coca leaf to cocaine), at least 800 tons of cocaine were produced out of the 1997 coca-leaf harvest; applying a slightly less cautious overall conversion ratio of 1000:3 (which is easy for cocaine manufacturers to reach), the estimated amount of illicit coca-leaf production for 1997 would have yielded about 1,000 tons of cocaine. With seizures of around 300 tons of cocaine per annum (1995-96), 500-700 tons of cocaine may have thus been available for consumption. Seizures of coca leaf of 700 tons per annum (1995-96), equivalent to 2.1 tons of cocaine, are almost negligible quantities and do not change the overall picture. The same is true for domestic consumption of coca leaf which is largely covered by traditional coca-leaf production

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