LANDI KOTAL, April 27: Opium prices in the NWFP market have fallen considerably during the past one and a half months due to large quantities of the contraband arriving in rural markets from remote tribal areas.

Information gathered from markets in tribal agencies revealed that a huge quantity of both fresh (wet) and old (dry) opium is stocked at Bagh bazaar in Tirah valley and different markets in Bara in the Khyber Agency and Meshtho Mela in the Orakzai Agency. Trading is also in full swing in Mohmand Agency.

Although poppy cultivation was strictly banned and the authorities even destroyed standing poppy crops over a vast area in Khyber, Mohmand and Orakzai agencies, a good number of tribesmen defied the ban and cultivated the crop in remote locations inaccessible to the authorities.

Sources told this scribe that the crop was even cultivated by some tribesmen inside their fort-like homes in Landi Kotal and Zakhakhel areas in Khyber Agency. They said that the tribesmen have finished opium collection from the plains areas, while opium harvesting was still in progress in the hill areas.

When asked why the price of opium has dropped in tribal areas, government officials argued that the contraband was being smuggled from Afghanistan as the neighbouring country had a bumper crop this year. They agreed that the government was unable to check the cultivation of poppy in the remote parts of the Pakistani tribal belt.

Additional Home Secretary Manzoor Ahmad told Dawn that some tribesmen in the Khyber, Mohmand and Orakzai agencies had defied the ban and cultivated the poppy in hill areas, and many tribesmen had cultivated the crop secretly as they hoped that the prices would again shoot up.

An opium dealer in Bara, Haji Daman, told Dawn that fresh or wet opium was being sold at Rs 6,000 to Rs 7,500 per kilogramme, while old or dried opium was going for Rs 12,000 to Rs 14,000 per kilogramme. Two years back, one kilogramme of fresh opium was being sold for Rs 18,000, while the dried opium was sold at Rs 45,000 per kilogramme.

Haji Daman said that a large quantity of opium was still pouring into the market, which would further bring down prices. He said he did not think that the contraband was being smuggled into Pakistan from Afghanistan, but that almost 90 per cent of the stock in the market had come from the tribal areas.

Another dealer, Haji Abdur Rahim, said that many of his co- dealers had earned millions of rupees in the opium trade two and a half years back, while others had incurred huge losses due to the fall in market prices as they had bought the commodity at high prices.

Haji Rahim also said that he himself incurred huge financial losses in the opium trade due to rapid and frequent fluctuations in its prices.