PUERTO VALLARTA (PVDN) - In a groundbreaking study unveiled this Thursday in the esteemed journal Science, researchers from the Complexity Science Hub in Vienna disclosed that drug trafficking ranks as the fifth largest employer in Mexico, engaging between 160,000 and 185,000 individuals. The study also revealed that thwarting new recruitment is crucial to diminishing the escalating violence associated with drug cartels. The criminal groups reportedly rope in 350 people every week to sustain their operations.
Led by former Mexico City police officer Rafael Prieto Curiel, the study is deemed one of the most ambitious attempts to numerically quantify the strength and impact of criminal groups in Mexico. Curiel stated, “Neither through the courts nor through prisons. The only way to reduce violence in Mexico is to cut off cartel recruitment.” The data for this study was meticulously amassed by analyzing murders, disappearances, imprisonments, and desertions from criminal factions between 2012 and 2022.
One of the stark revelations from the study was that despite the incarceration of thousands of cartel members - approximately 6,000 annually - the size of these nefarious organizations has swelled over the past decade. By the end of 2022, these criminal groups boasted 60,000 more members than in 2012, totaling around 175,000. This statistic propels drug cartels to the position of the fifth largest employer in Mexico, surpassing notable companies like Pemex and Oxxo, and only outdone by FEMSA (Coca-Cola bottler), Walmart, Manpower, and América Móvil.
The data also delineated the distribution of members among the cartels: nearly two out of every ten drug traffickers are aligned with the Jalisco Nueva Generación Cartel, and one in ten is associated with the Sinaloa Cartel. This assessment solely counts individuals directly embroiled in violence, excluding other key players like financial managers responsible for laundering illicit funds.
The dark side of this illicit industry was further highlighted by the loss cartels endure, with 17% of their recruits over ten years meeting a violent end. Curiel pointed out that to counterbalance the continuous loss from arrests and fatal incidents, cartels are impelled to recruit 350 individuals weekly. Many recruits are forcefully conscripted, exacerbating the anguish of the victims' families.
The study suggests a half-decrease in cartel recruitment would yield an 11% reduction in their size by 2027, accentuating a preventive strategy's superiority over conventional reactive approaches. Conversely, if the status quo persists, 2027 could witness a 40% uptick in drug-related deaths and a 26% growth in cartel memberships.
Defined as a pioneering venture to demystify “the black box” of drug trafficking through numerical representation, this study is hailed by Eduardo Salcedo Albarán, the director of crime research firm SciVortex, as an "amazing" mathematical model and a robust foundation for enhanced future investigations into cartels. Albarán urges Mexican authorities at all tiers to explore diverse strategies to combat this entrenched issue, remarking, “The hardest part is bringing these ideas to the real world.”
