The Congress finds that—

(1) the illicit narcotics epidemic currently afflicting the United States represents a direct threat to the well-being of every United States citizen;

(2) every effective means must be pursued to reduce the foreign production and subsequent importation into the United States of illicit narcotics;

(3) the multilateral development banks can play an integral role in efforts to control the production of illicit narcotics;

(4) producer country narcotics eradication programs will not be effective unless such programs provide an economic alternative to the production of narcotics;

(5) efforts to address the illicit narcotics epidemic through production control are doomed to failure unless greater effort is applied to curb use of and demand for illicit narcotics; and

(6) the appropriate role for the multilateral development banks in the “War Against Drugs” is through coordinating and financing alternative economic opportunities in producer and trafficking countries.

The Secretary of the Treasury shall instruct the United States Executive Director of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the United States Executive Director of the Inter-American Development Bank to initiate discussions with other executive directors of such institutions and to advocate and support the creation, within such institutions, of specific country lending programs and policies (including crop substitution, creation of roads conducive to the expansion of markets for licit goods, other infrastructure development measures such as development projects generating employment, agricultural extension assistance, and region-specific development plans) which are particularly oriented to reducing or eliminating the economic dependence of regions of borrowing countries known to be areas in which illicit narcotics are produced or trafficked, on such production and trafficking.

In addition, the Secretary of the Treasury should instruct the United States Executive Director of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development and the United States Executive Director of the Inter-American Development Bank to encourage such institutions to provide coordination among other multilateral and bilateral assistance programs designed to reduce the economic dependence of regions of borrowing countries known to be areas in which illicit narcotics are produced or trafficked, on such production and trafficking.

(Pub. L. 95–118, title XVI, § 1606, as added Pub. L. 100–461, title V, § 555, Oct. 1, 1988, 102 Stat. 2268–36.)