Coca

Lore & Background

The coca plant is a shrub, growing two to three meters tall, with curved branches and oval leaves marked by distinctive curved lines. Its small, yellowish-white flowers develop into red berries.

Species

Four cultivated varieties exist, all domesticated from the wild species Erythroxylum gracilipes by different South American groups during the Holocene. Two main species are Erythroxylum coca and Erythroxylum novogranatense, each with two varieties adapted to different regions: the Bolivian or Huánuco coca of the eastern Andes, the Amazonian coca of the lowland basin, the Colombian coca suited to drier highlands, and the Trujillo coca grown in Peru, including for Coca-Cola's decocainized leaf extract. A glyphosate-resistant form, Boliviana negra, emerged after Colombia's aerial eradication campaign.

Pharmacological aspects

Coca leaves contain the psychoactive alkaloid cocaine, ranging from 0.23% to 0.96% in dry leaves. When chewed or consumed as tea, the natural leaf provides a mild stimulant effect through slower absorption than purified cocaine, with no evidence of addiction or withdrawal from traditional use. Extracting cocaine requires an acid–base chemical process using several solvents. The plant thrives in hot, humid environments and can be harvested multiple times a year from tended plots.

In South America

Chewing coca leaves dates back at least 8,000 years in South America, as shown by leaf fragments and calcite found in house floors in Peru's Nanchoc Valley, indicating early communal use alongside the rise of farming. Under Inca rule, coca was deeply integrated into society for labor, religion, and trade, and the Incas colonized new lands to cultivate it. Spanish colonizers initially tried to suppress its use but later relied on it to sustain enslaved laborers. Across Andean cultures, the leaves have traditionally served medicinal, nutritional, religious, and social purposes, primarily through chewing and tea.

Today, coca is grown as a cash crop in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, and Peru, including in areas where cultivation is unlawful. There are reports of cultivation in southern Mexico using seeds from South America as an alternative to smuggling processed cocaine. The plant remains fundamental to many Amazonian and Andean cultures, as well as indigenous groups in Colombia's Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta.

Commercial and industrial uses

Commercially, coca leaves are used in teas, foods, cosmetics, and beverages, with growing political and market support in Bolivia and Peru despite restrictions elsewhere. The 1961 United Nations Single Convention prohibited the coca leaf without distinguishing it from cocaine, a stance widely contested by Bolivia and Peru, who have led efforts for reevaluation, including a scheduled 2025 WHO review based on cultural and scientific grounds. Outside South America, the leaf is generally illegal or heavily restricted, with limited exceptions for scientific or medical use and for authorized imports like the decocainized extract used in Coca-Cola flavoring in the United States.

Reader's Guide

Coca thrives in hot, humid environments and can be harvested multiple times a year from carefully tended plots. The seeds are sown from December to January in small plots sheltered from the sun.

The leaves are gathered from plants varying in age from one and a half to upwards of forty years, but only the new fresh growth is harvested. The first and most abundant harvest is in March after the rainy season, the second at the end of June, and the third in October or November. The green leaves are spread in thin layers on coarse woollen cloths and dried in the sun, then packed in sacks kept dry to preserve quality.

Did You Know?

• Coca-Cola used coca leaf extract in its products from 1885 until about 1903, when it switched to using a decocainized leaf extract.
• Boliviana negra, also known as supercoca or la millionaria, is a form of coca resistant to glyphosate, with no evidence of genetic modification.