A global report on the illicit drugs trade has underscored New Zealand concerns about foreign students being used to take delivery of in this country.
"Most shipments of preparations containing pseudoephedrine appear to be ... by Asian organised criminal groups based in New Zealand that use Asian students studying in that country," said the Vienna-based International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) in its report for 2009.
Released today, the report noted China was a major source of the pseudoephedrine tablets being seized.
The paper from the INCB -- the United Nations global drugs watchdog -- matches concerns Auckland police expressed earlier this month about alarming numbers of foreign students being used as "catchers" for mailed packages containing pseudoephedrine-based Contact NT cold tablets.
The pharmaceutical is legal in China, but is a class C drug in New Zealand and importing it carries a maximum penalty of eight years in prison.
Ten students have been arrested in the past three months and are before the courts.
Customs officials have reported pseudoephedrine is often found several times a week, mainly in mail coming from China.
The INCB report said: "China has emerged as a major source of pseudoephedrine tablets seized at the New Zealand border.
"There have also been reports that pseudoephedrine tablets are smuggled into New Zealand from several countries in Oceania, including Fiji, Papua New Guinea and Tonga".
"In recent years, there has been a significant increase in the smuggling of pharmaceutical preparations containing pseudoephedrine into New Zealand, indicating continued illicit manufacture of amphetamine-type stimulants," the report said.
The number of pseudoephedrine tablets seized in 2008 was almost 13 times that seized in 2002.
"The annual prevalence rate of amphetamine and methamphetamine abuse in New Zealand is among the highest in the world".
The rate in New Zealand had declined gradually from its peak level at 5 per cent in 2001 to 3.4 per cent in 2006, and a recent survey suggested that among people aged 15-45, the annual prevalence rate further dropped to 1.4 per cent in 2009.
Most of the methamphetamine seized in New Zealand had been illicitly manufactured here.
The number of clandestine methamphetamine laboratories dismantled dropped from 211 in 2006, to 190 in 2007 and 133 in 2008 even while large amounts of the chemicals used in them continued to be seized at the border.
"The fact that the amount of precursors seized at the border remains large suggest that illicit drug manufacturers may be devising new methods," the board said.
According to the Customs Service, the number of seizures of precursors had increased by 12 times in the past six years.
Cannabis continued to be the drug most commonly seized in Oceania, and illicit cultivation continued not only in Australia and New Zealand but also in Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Samoa and Tonga.
There was a concern that organised crime developing the cannabis trade in those countries would re-invest the profits in illicit manufacture of other drugs, such as methamphetamine.
In New Zealand, 98 per cent of cannabis abusers surveyed in 2008 as part of an annual study described the availability of cannabis as "very easy" or "easy". In 2008, New Zealand reported the seizure of 700 kg of cannabis herb and 156,000 cannabis plants.
