The demand for cocaine has never been so strong in France. In total, 1.1 million people have used it at least once a year in 2023, according to the latest study by the French Observatory of Drugs and Addictive Tendencies (OFDT), published Wednesday January 15. This is almost double the number recorded in the previous report (600,000 people), which covered 2022.
In detail, 2.7% of adults surveyed have experimented with cocaine in 2023 (3.9% of men and 1.6% of women), detailed the OFDT in other results revealed in June 2024. Nearly one in ten people (9.4%) say they have already consumed it in their life (13.4% among men, 5.5% among women).
France is now the seventh European country where consumption of the psychoactive is the highest. Why such an increase? Franceinfo lists the factors explaining this increase.
Global production hits record high
The three main producing countries – Colombia, Bolivia and Peru – have never produced so much cocaine, with 2,700 tonnes in 2022 compared to 1,134 tonnes in 2010, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime . This increase in the production of white powder is visible at the other end of the chain, since French authorities seized 23.5 tonnes of cocaine in 2023, compared to 4.1 tonnes in 2010.
Over the first eleven months of 2024, nearly 47 tonnes of cocaine were seized by the French services. In recent years we have observed a “diversification of cocaine routes with the important role of the French West Indies as transit zones towards the mainland“, notes the OFDT. French Guiana more recently became “a direct source through mule traffic”specifies the public body.
An overall falling price, for an increasing content
The price of a gram of cocaine hydrochloride has been decreasing since 2018, since it went from 70 euros per gram that year, to 66 euros in 2023, again according to the OFDT, which is based on figures from the Office anti -narcotics (Ofast). Accessibility of cocaine is becoming easier “by split sales” : it can be sold “per half gram at 30 or 40 euros” or for small amounts via “‘pooches’ sold for 15 or 20 euros”, explains the OFDT.
A very clear increase in the purity of cocaine has also been observed over the past ten years, with an average rate on French territory “which reaches 73% in 2023 compared to 49% in 2013”according to data from the national forensic service in 2023, cited by the OFDT.
Ever more sophisticated sales practices
Drug sellers are constantly improving their sales techniques in order to reach a wider range of consumers. “Merchandising and marketing practices continue to improve, with many traffic networks relying on attractive packaging, promotions, the offer of goodies, carefully edited photos and videos, mobilizing for example usage drones or sequence shots”notes the OFDT.
The organization emphasizes that “home delivery of drugs continues to extend to new territories (secondary towns, even small towns, such as in Picardy or the Meuse) and to improve (with, for example, the possibility of tracking your order by a GPS system)”. Some consumers even admit to having the drugs delivered by “postal route” in particular to avoid the “physical contact with a member of a trafficking network”.
Sales efficiency can also be explained by “specialization” increase of the different players in the resale chain, which is divided between “management of product stocks, their packaging, supply from the point of sale, surveillance in the event of the police arriving, resale to customers” or even “managing accounts on social networks”.
An increase in the consumption of “crack”
OFDT researchers note a sharp increase in the consumption of “cocaine based”either “the solid and smokable form of the product”better known as “crack”. Since the end of the 2010s, this use constitutes “the most striking trend in drug use among marginalized people”.
For the year 2023, the reception and support centers for risk reduction for drug users (Caarud) and the addiction care, support and prevention centers (Csapa) report an increase in consumption of cocaine based “among many people living on the streets”. The drop in prices makes purchasing cocaine in this form easier than before, especially in certain cities like “Rennes, Lyon or Grenoble”, where the “caillou” and the “crack cake” are sold “between 10 and 20 euros”. “When you beg, it’s quicker to collect 10 euros [pour acheter du crack déjà prêt à consommer] than 30 euros [pour acheter un demi-gramme de cocaïne chlorhydrate que la personne basera ensuite elle-même]“explains to the OFDT a professional from a Caarud in Brittany.
These medico-social establishments intended to welcome and monitor consumers, deplore “the insufficiency of existing means to combat cocaine-based addiction”. They particularly regret “the absence of effective drug treatment, such as those proposed for opioid dependence”.
A “trivialization” of the image of cocaine
Questioned by AFP, Ivana Obradovic, deputy director of the OFDT, notes a certain “trivialization of the image of cocaine, a drug which has become ‘familiar’ and perceived as ‘less dangerous’ than twenty years ago”. Another report from the OFDT produced in March 2023, taking stock of the state of the cocaine market and its consumption in France since the 2000s, shows that awareness of this narcotic product increased between 1999 and 2018. .
Cocaine use also appears less and less like a pathology: the proportion of respondents believing that those who use cocaine do so “because they don’t find their place in society” (37%) or “because of family problems” (32%) is increasingly weak and “more and more close to that of cannabis“, notes the OFDT. A significant portion of those questioned (39%) consider that consuming cocaine “can be a lifestyle choice”.
“While, in the 1980s and 1990s, cocaine use mainly concerned people from privileged social backgrounds, close to the world of entertainment, or on the contrary to the public marginalized outside the labor market (…), it is now consumed in many categories of the active population (employed or not)”we can read in the March 2023 report. And the OFDT adds: “Cocaine experimentation now affects people working in all sectors professionals.”
Increased consumption to “stay at work”
The distribution of cocaine, however, remains more widespread in certain sectors of activity, starting with that of accommodation and catering (nearly one in ten experimenters is in this professional group, “three times more than the average”), explained the OFDT two years ago. Next comes the arts, entertainment and recreational services sector (18% of experimenters, up to 26% among men), then that of information and communication (9.7% of experimenters).
Furthermore, “without this being measured by general population surveys, public authorities and professionals in the maritime professions, particularly in Brittany, report consumption common among fishermen”underline the OFDT researchers. The latter cite the Ministry of Ecological Transition, according to which “consumption of psychoactive substances among French seafarers is higher than that observed among workers in other sectors of activity”.
“The evolution of working conditions” appears to be a factor in the increase in the use of cocaine among active people who use it to “keep working, either to withstand intensive work schedules, or to cope with the arduousness of working conditions”underlines Ivana Obradovic.
