“The war on drugs has failed.” Colombian president Gustavo Petro made this statement in his inauguration speech on August 7, 2022, marking one of the priorities of the first leftist government in Colombia’s history. Petro aims to turn around the drug policy of his country, which leads cocaine production worldwide and was the closest ally of the United States in the relentlessly violent fight against drug trafficking. The military strategy, according to the former guerrillero turned president, has produced a “genocide” that has cost the lives of “a million Latin Americans.”

Under the title “Sowing life, we banish drug trafficking,” the government has presented a roadmap to guide Colombia’s drug policy until 2033. The new plan shares some goals with previous ones, such as eradicating ninety thousand hectares of illegal coca leaf cultivation and reducing cocaine production by 43 percent. However, its approach is very different, as the goal is for sixty-nine thousand hectares to be eradicated voluntarily, promoting alternatives for the farmers who grow the leaf.

For decades, Colombia’s fight against drug trafficking has primarily been an assault on farmers who produce coca, a leaf that is also used for licit purposes such as infusions or even fertilizers. In Bolivia, coca has constitutional protection as cultural heritage for its traditional use by indigenous peoples; in Colombia, it has been stigmatized, as in a famous campaign that called it “la mata que mata” (the plant that kills). The new policy distinguishes between the leaf and the cocaine made from it.