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Comprehensive and Sustainable Alternative Development
The reactivation of the Group of Experts on Comprehensive and Sustainable Alternative Development (CSAD) was approved at the Fifty-Eighth Regular Session of CICAD-OAS held in Trujillo, Peru, in November 2015. This Expert Group, under Peru presidency, is a “high-level technical space to address, according to the realities and needs of each country, the different experiences, principles, new trends, threats, and problems facing comprehensive and sustainable Alternative Development - and, where appropriate, preventive alternative development- in the hemisphere, with a focus on human development". As agreed, the Executive Secretariat convened the Meeting of the Expert Group on Comprehensive and Sustainable Alternative Development, in the city of Lima, Peru, from May 18 to 19, 2016, in response to the offer by the Government of Peru.
In this hemisphere, OAS Member States have taken a fundamental step in attempting to extend the Alternative Development concept towards a strategic concept of Comprehensive and Sustainable Alternative Development. Although the traditional concept of Alternative Development refers explicitly to a rural context, a number of CICAD Member States have favored a broader concept of alternative development, including not only drug-related actors at each stage (production, distribution, consumption, trafficking), but also other dynamics, such as forced labor in clandestine laboratories, the use of chemical precursors, the increase of new psychoactive substances; and including groups in situations of vulnerability both in rural and urban areas under the umbrella of sustainable development.
In this regard, this broader concept is included in the CICAD/OAS Hemispheric Drug Strategy (2010), and in the Plan of Action (2016-2020), as it adopts comprehensive and sustainable Alternative Development measures and law enforcement based on the needs of each country in order to provide better quality of life for all those with high vulnerability conditions, affected by the economy of illegal drugs and illicit activities related to drugs both in urban and rural areas.
The concept has also been revitalized by the consensus at UNGASS 2016, namely, that the Sustainable Development Goals should be applied to drug policy. Currently, CICAD Member States are leading the discussions about a new understanding of alternative development that incorporates illicit economies in urban environments as well as the traditional rural focus. Discussing how the recommendations of the UNGASS outcome document can be translated into action, giving policy recommendations to shape the deeply interrelated drug-and-development-agenda, bearing in mind the differences between the CICAD – OAS Member States, in terms of their concepts, priorities, level of implementation and experience. The CICAD Executive Secretariat is currently providing support to the Expert Group in the development of indicators, tools and concepts, as part of the group´s work plan.
updated on 4/27/2017 4:28:15 PM
