Avocado and Lime Farmers Strike Huge Blows to Mexican Drug Cartel

For the first time in nearly a decade, peace has returned to Michoacán, a state in Western Mexico, formerly ruled by the cartel, the Caballeros Templarios or the Knights Templar. Homicide rates have fallen in Michoacán and cartel members have fled from the state. Though the Mexican government has killed or captured three of the top leaders of the cartel, it was a band of armed civilians, consisting mostly of Avocado and Lime farmers that pushed the Knights Templar from the state. 

The Knights Templar emerged in March 2011, presenting themselves as a “self defense” movement, acting on behalf of the Michoacán population against Mexico’s larger criminal cartels. In an effort to portray themselves as conducting “altruistic activities” in the fight against “materialism, injustice and tyranny,” the group utilized religious imagery in all public displays. Their name is even a reference to a medieval military-religious order that defended pilgrims on their journey to the Holy Land. 

Though depicting themselves as a defense group opposed to organized crime in Mexico, the Knights Templar is responsible for drug trafficking, extortion, and kidnapping in Michoacán and across central Mexico. Operating in Morelos, Guanajuato, Queretaro, Guerrero, and southeastern Jalisco, the group is considered to be the third largest cartel in Mexico following the Sinaloa Cartel and Zeta cartel. 

One of the largest industries exploited by the Knights Templar is the avocado industry. The cartel extorts local avocado growers, kills farm hands and farmers, and appropriates their property. Michoacán, the world’s largest producer of avocados exported nearly $1 billion worth of avocados to the United States from 2012 to 2013. Of the $1 billion, between $130 to 300 million was extorted by the Knights Templar. The Templars not only demanded money from farmers but also took over plantations and packing plants. One farmer, choosing to remain anonymous, reported that two of his sons were kidnapped and killed after he refused to turn over his avocado plantation to the Templars. 

The government in Michoacán did little, if anything, to help farmers threatened or extorted by the Templar. As a matter of fact, the Templars were embedded within the government in Michoacán. Using both intimidation and kickbacks, the Templars were able to manipulate candidates in elections and push their own agenda in the government. As proof of the corruption in Michoacan, even before the Templars took control of the state in 2009, 10 mayors and 20 other local officials were detained as part of a drug investigation. In April of this year, three Michoacán officials were arrested for alleged links to the Knights Templar, including the mayor of the port city Lazaro Cardenas. 

Since the government proved to be ineffective in combatting the Knights Templar, a group of civilians began a vigilante movement to challenge the Knights’ supremacy. Carrying handguns, assault rifles, and even rocket launchers, the civilian militia fought to regain control of their state. Interestingly enough neither international drug trafficking, nor cartel turf wars was behind the rise of self-defense militias in Michoacán. Rather it was criminal activity such as the extortion of avocado farmers affecting the economic and community life of residents that gave rise to the vigilante movement. 

The demise of the Knights Templar has implications for the international drug trade. As violence along the Mexico-United States border continues and law enforcement crack-downs on cartels such as the Knights Templar escalates, traffickers in South America need new paths to import cocaine into the United States. As a result, cocaine is increasingly being smuggled to Puerto Rico instead of Mexico and then to the continental United States. Since Puerto Rico is a commonwealth of the United States, once in Puerto Rico, packages containing cocaine do not need to clear customs. The increase of trafficking in Puerto Rico appears to have resulted in more violence in Puerto Rico. From 2005 to this year, Puerto Rico’s average homicide rate rose from roughly 19 murders to 26.2 murders per 100,000 residents. Such a rate is even higher than Mexico’s 23.7 murders per 100,000 residents this year. 

While the Knights Templar recently suffered big blows, it is important to note that the international drug trade is relatively unaffected. Supply has simply begun to shift elsewhere, as has the violence that accompanies it.