The aim of this review is to provide an overview and analysis of the contents of the 2010 UNODC World Drug Report and highlight a number of key issues of interest and concern. The authors begin with a critique of Mr. Costa’s contribution to the publication and often the only part of the 300-page document that receives significant attention: the Executive Director’s Foreword. They also reflect briefly upon his tenure at the UNODC between 2002 and 2010.

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Mindful of the volume of market related and trend oriented data within the Report, the authors then move onto to provide a summary of the global picture as presented by the UNODC in the main body of the text. Within this section, they also highlight ongoing examples of the Office’s increasingly sophisticated and transparent methodology. This approach emphasizes the continuingly high levels of uncertainty concerning many aspects of the global market. This is followed by discussion of a reoccurring theme running throughout the Report; the issue of displacement. 

The final section of this IDPC report is devoted to a discussion of chapter three of this year’s publication, “The Destabilizing Influence of Drug Trafficking on Transit Countries: The Case of Cocaine.”