Australians’ love affair with illicit drugs is scaling new heights following a record-breaking $12.4 billion outlay as sewerage systems show cocaine is king for many Sydneysiders.
The Australian Crime Intelligence Commission (ACIC) on Tuesday released its annual snapshot of illicit drugs in wastewater, concluding Australians spent $12.4 billion on methylamphetamine, cocaine, heroin and MDMA between August 2022 and August 2023.
Sydney retained its title as the cocaine capital of Australia, the report found.
Of the 4.037 tonnes of cocaine taken nationally, almost half – 1.9 tonnes – was hoovered up in NSW, with Sydneysiders taking the “lion’s share”, ACIC acting national manager data analytics Shane Neilson told the Herald.
“That’s an amazing quantity – a very, very high figure.”
In Sydney, testing carried out at five wastewater sites – the location of which is kept secret to protect the program’s integrity – found the highest mean consumption of the drug across Australia.
Users in Melbourne and Brisbane used more cocaine per capita than Sydneysiders in one week of August last year, but long-term data proved NSW and its capital were significantly higher consumers than elsewhere last year, Neilson said.
The commission has been testing wastewater for drugs since 2016. Cocaine usage has come back dramatically since a post-pandemic supply issue.
Experts and law enforcement officials say Sydney’s unique economic and demographic structure, as well as its geography, make cocaine trafficking attractive to criminal cartels. The city has the highest median household income in Australia, almost 20 per cent higher than the national average, the latest census shows.
As a result, a number of these cashed-up residents can afford the drug, which many find socially acceptable. Sydney’s position as a major port of entry for goods, both legal and otherwise, makes it easier for cocaine to be widely available.
Cocaine is king for many Sydneysiders.Credit: Artwork: Marija Ercegovac
The cost-of-living pressures besetting many Australians appear to have had no impact on the price of illicit drugs.
“The price is set by serious and organised crime groups, and it stays relatively constant,” Neilson said.
“Organised crime is making a significant profit at every level, there’s no need to cut prices to increase market share because the market is there. You make so much profit at the existing level.”
Only Saudi Arabia, where a drug conviction will get you beheaded, has higher prices for illicit drugs.
Priced at up to $400 per gram, cocaine and its importation have made fortunes for key players in Sydney’s underworld and the bosses controlling the movement of the drug into Australia from offshore.
“This is money laundered domestically and out of Australia to line the pockets of serious organised crime bosses offshore,” the ACIC report reads.
It has also cast a shadow over the city, with control of the lucrative trade sparking conflict culminating in fatal public place shootings like the assassination of Bondi man Alen Moradian last June.
National Drugs and Alcohol Research Centre (NDARC) director Professor Michael Farrell said wastewater analysis provides “semi-objective data about the size of the market” that can be used with other studies to provide a comprehensive picture of drug taking in Australia.
Off the back of significant post-pandemic shortages, NDARC has also seen a resurgence in cocaine usage in Sydney, he said. “By international standards, drugs are relatively expensive in Australia – cocaine is pricier than in Europe – it makes it an attractive market to drug traffickers,” he said.
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