Received January 11, 2024/ Approved March 05, 2024 Pages: 40-54
eISSN: 2600-5745
Centro Sur Vol. 8 No. 3 – July - September
destination of the container to be exported. With that information,
drivers are enticed along the way and others are part of the criminal
structure. However, the network of corruption extends to other
vulnerable bodies, such as the operational personnel of the ports, who
run the risk of being recruited by criminal organisations, either
willingly or through extortion mechanisms (Onofa, 2022).
Different people are continuously detained for investigations and links
to these criminal networks are uncovered. In February 2022, the police
arrested eight people involved, including truck drivers, technicians
and crane operators at the port of Guayaquil, who tried to contaminate
a container of bananas bound for Belgium with three tonnes of drugs.
According to Karla Arteaga, Head of the Ports and Airports
Investigation Unit (UIPA): "The criminal organisations seek to recruit
people to work in the ports, because of the access they have to
contaminate the containers with drugs. They do not belong to a fixed
structure, they are hired by different gangs, the structures used to be
pyramids, now they are organised into cells, whose members do not
know to whom they are sending the drugs' (Primicias.ec, 2022).
Ecuador has eight main ports, the two largest of which operate in
Guayaquil: Contecon and DP World Posorja. "The gangs choose
Belgium because of the cost of marketing the drug. A kilo of cocaine
costs USD 1,900 in Ecuador, around USD 5,000 in Central America,
USD 20,000 in North America and up to USD 60,000 in European
countries," said the head of the UIPA.
Effects of drug contamination in containers
Two ways of analysing the effects of drug contamination in containers
are proposed, one from the dimensions of the export process and the
other from those involved in the operation. For the review of the
dimensions, we should point out that these are: social, economic, legal
and security. On the other hand, if we refer to the vision of those
affected, we will point to the product, the people, the companies and
the country, which affect different levels of our society in a broad
manner.
The export sector is not only affected by the costs of a possible seizure
of the product or the goods being frozen. The loss of clients abroad
must also be taken into account, as well as all the legal processes such
as going to the Public Prosecutor's Office and hiring lawyers to face the
process of determining how the contamination occurred and whether
it is the company's responsibility. According to Rosero, all these