Members of the National Institute of Forensic Sciences organize packages of confiscated cocaine in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, on February 26 before incinerating 5,038 pounds of the drug after seizures made under the U.S.-led Operation Southern Spear, an international initiative to combat drug trafficking in Latin America. Photo by Orlando Barria/EPA
Feb. 27 (UPI) — The global cocaine market is the fastest-growing segment of the illicit drug trade, driven by rising production in South America and increasing demand in Africa and Asia, according to a United Nations report released this week.
Ecuador, meanwhile, has become one of the countries most affected by violence and the expansion of drug trafficking routes, the report said.
The findings appear in the 2025 report of the International Narcotics Control Board, the U.N. body responsible for monitoring compliance with international drug control treaties. It was published Thursday.
Global cocaine production exceeded 3,700 metric tons in 2023, a 34% increase compared with 2022, according to the control board.
The expansion is largely attributed to Colombia, where both the area under illicit coca cultivation and the production capacity of clandestine laboratories increased.
“The global cocaine market continues to expand and diversify,” the board said, warning that trafficking routes now reach “all regions of the world.”
While Western and Central Europe and North America remain the main destination markets, the report highlights rising consumption and seizures in Africa and parts of Asia.
In Africa, seizures rose 48% in 2023 compared with the previous year, which the report said reflects an expanding market rather than merely a transit region.
Between 2013 and 2023, the number of cocaine users worldwide increased from 17 million to 25 million, according to U.N. data.
Against this backdrop, Ecuador has emerged as a critical hub.
“In South America, the impact of increased cocaine trafficking has been felt particularly in Ecuador, which in recent years has experienced a wave of lethal violence caused by both local and transnational criminal groups,” the control board said.
Ecuadorian authorities seized more than 290 metric tons of cocaine in 2024, an unprecedented figure and approximately 30% higher than in 2023.
The surge in trafficking has coincided with a deterioration in security. The country recorded 6,964 violent deaths in 2024, with a homicide rate of 38.76 per 100,000 inhabitants, meaning the rate has quintupled over five years.
The report notes that Ecuador has become a major maritime export hub for cocaine shipments bound for the European Union.
In March 2025, Ecuadorian and European authorities dismantled an intercontinental criminal network that shipped tons of cocaine in maritime containers from South America to Europe.
In that operation, 73 metric tons of cocaine were seized in Ecuador and several European Union countries. Authorities arrested 14 people in Germany and Spain and 36 in the port city of Guayaquil, according to the report.
The control board also warned that traffickers are using increasingly sophisticated concealment methods to evade controls, including chemically altering cocaine to hinder detection during routine inspections, embedding the drug in plastics and textiles and using double-bottom compartments in legitimate goods.
Offshore deliveries coordinated through geolocation systems have also been seen.
As an example, the report cited the 2024 seizure of 13 metric tons of cocaine at the port of Algeciras in Spain, hidden in a shipment of bananas from Ecuador and described as the largest cocaine seizure in the country’s history.
The report further warns that sustained increases in production and the diversification of routes reflect a structural transformation of the global cocaine market, with criminal networks operating in an increasingly transnational manner and with greater logistical capacity.
The board stressed that the phenomenon is no longer limited to traditional production or consumption regions but now involves multiple continents at different stages of the drug trafficking chain.