Fentanyl Trafficking

The illegal manufacture, smuggling and distribution of fentanyl and its analogues, a synthetic opioid many times more potent than morphine, through a supply chain estimated to run overwhelmingly through Mexico, with approximately ninety eight percent of fentanyl entering the United States transiting that route; Mexican trafficking organizations typically source precursor chemicals from suppliers in China, such as the Yuancheng Group, before finishing production in Mexico and smuggling the finished drug north. Production and precursor sourcing are dispersing to additional countries, including Nigeria, South Africa, Indonesia, Myanmar and the Netherlands. The trade is highly profitable because production costs are low relative to street value: a kilogram of heroin laced with fentanyl can sell for more than one hundred thousand dollars, while the fentanyl itself can be produced for roughly six thousand dollars per kilogram, and prices on illicit online markets have averaged around fourteen hundred seventy dollars per gram for small quantities. Enforcement is complicated by a vast and diffuse network of brokers operating both within and outside established trafficking organizations, and by the fact that many of the precursor chemicals used to manufacture fentanyl also have legitimate industrial uses and remain unregulated or only lightly controlled in key countries including the United States, Mexico and China.