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AIN short film explores community coca control in Bolivia

Dec 14, 2016

Created by AIN and Bolivian filmmaker Ismael Saavedra, with funding from Open Society Foundations, “Hoja por Hoja: Community Coca Control in Bolivia” traces the transition in the Chapare region from violent, ineffectual forced eradication and conditioned alternative development to collaborative community coca control and integral development. Through interviews with coca grower union leaders and policy experts, “Hoja por Hoja” explores how community coca control has reduced conflict and poverty, increased economic  diversification, improved local infrastructure and basic services, respects human rights, and even decreased coca cultivation itself in  Bolivia. This unique, innovative strategy shifts the yardstick for progress from eradication and arrest indicators to the wellbeing of local communities.