Record year: 31 tonnes of cocaine stopped at Antwerp port

The term “record year” is wonderfully ambiguous, but at 31 tonnes, two tonnes more cocaine was discovered in the port of Antwerp than the previous year. The nervousness surrounding the drug problem in Antwerp has been growing for several months, but explaining the record is not easy. “In the drug trade you see a system of supply and demand, albeit entirely illegal, at work,” says FPS Finance spokesman Francis Adyns. “If we clocked off at 31 tonnes today, we have to ask whether higher demand, higher production or more efficient screening preceded that figure. Perhaps it is a mix of the three.”