Photo courtesy of www.erowid.org*

Photo courtesy of www.csdl.tamu.edu

The coca plant (Erythroxylon coca) is a shrub indigenous to northern South America, mainly in the Andean highlands.  It is also grown in Taiwan, Africa, and parts of Southeast Asia.  It stands at around eight feet tall, and grows best under tropical conditions.  The plant was first described in the 1780's, although it had applications long before Lamarck gave it its binomial name in 1786 (Krol, 1998).  There are several estimates as to when the plant was domesticated, but somewhere around 1000 B.C. seems to be a reasonable estimate.  While it does have flowers, the leaves are the useful portion of the plant.  This is because they contain the alkaloid cocaine, the purest form of the substance.  South American natives have been known to chew on the leaves, which give them the stamina needed to combat high altitudes and long work days.  Currently, Columbia is the world's largest producer of the coca plant, as well as the largest exporter of cocaine.  Peru and Bolivia are also high producers of the plant.
 
 

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© Copyright 2000 Department of Biology, Davidson College, Davidson, NC 28036. Send comments, questions, and suggestions to: joferguson@davidson.edu