51 marijuana plantations, raided in Benguet towns

LA TRINIDAD, Benguet – Government forces recently raided 51 marijuana plantations and one hashish processing facility in Benguet worth millions of pesos.

            Gil Cesario P. Castro, regional director of the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency bared this saying the sites were located with help from Philippine Air Force choppers.

            The plantations, which produce about 30 to 40 percent of  marijuana supply in the country, had reportedly been untouched since the 1980s.

            Castro said P260,972,800 worth of marijuana were uprooted during a massive eradication operation in the towns of Kibungan and Bakun town in Benguet April 16.

            The marijuana cultivation sites were reportedly found in treacherous, towering rocky mountains and cavernous, steep-sided valleys, needing some of the operating units to rappel or cross rivers.      

            The rows of cannabis plants were likewise interspersed between rows of corns or vegetables or concealed by sunflowers and other shrubs.

            These were also hidden among bushes, cemeteries or inside caves, he said.

            Watering hoses, pesticide sprayers and commercial fertilizers for the marijuana plants were likewise found in place.

            Meanhile, the marijuana processing site was discovered underneath a big rock, where a heavy-duty hydraulic jack, one marijuana brick molding box made of iron, wooden separator plates, dried cannabis fruiting tops wooden compressing box with a wooden compressor and other paraphernalia for converting the fruiting tops into brick form were confiscated.

            The nine-team regiment of anti-narcotic units was composed of operatives from PDEA – CAR, PAF 1AD TOG1, Police Regional Office – Cordillera, Philippine Army 5th Infantry Division 503rd Brigade Civil Military Operations Battalion and Military Intelligence Group 1, National Bureau of Investigation  and Criminal Investigation and Detection Group in the Cordillera.

            Except for samples, the uprooted or seized marijuana were burned on-site.

            The samples were publicly burned at Camp BadoDangwa here last week participated in or witnessed by chairman Ronnie Ricketts of the Optical Media Board of the Philippines, media, local government units, civil society groups and operatives.