Grade Level: SrH-Adult
Producer: Filmakers Library
Closed Captioned: |
Running Time: 52 mins
Country of Origin: United States
Study Guide: No |
Copyright Date: 2000
Available in French: No
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Is the "war on drugs" effective? Or is it a colossal waste of money and manpower? Filmed over a year in four countries, this powerful documentary brings us coca-growing peasants, anti-narcotic patrols, and American lawmakers. The filmmakers gained unique access to the Colombian rebels who stand accused of protecting the drug trade. Millions of U.S. tax dollars are being spent to eradicate drug production in South America, but there is little evidence that this money will diminish supply. Coca Mama shows the disastrous effects of the policy on the coca farmers in Bolivia and Colombia, who are paid by the drug cartels to grow the coca and then attacked by drug patrols using fumigation planes. They spray the coca farms with poison, inadvertently killing all the crops, fish, plants and making the children sick. |
