The
Golden Triangle is a large, mountainous region of approximately 200,000 km
2 (77,000 sq mi) in northeastern
Myanmar, northwestern
Thailand and northern
Laos, centered on the confluence of the
Ruak and
Mekong rivers. The name "Golden Triangle" was coined by
Marshall Green, a U.S. State Department official, in 1971 in a press conference on the opium trade. Today, the Thai side of the river confluence,
Sop Ruak, has become a tourist attraction, with the House of Opium Museum, a Hall of Opium, and a Golden Triangle Park, and no opium cultivation.
The Golden Triangle has been one of the largest
opium-producing areas of the world since the 1950s. Most of the world's
heroin came from the Golden Triangle until the early 21st century when
opium production in Afghanistan increased. Myanmar was the world's second-largest source of opium after Afghanistan up to 2022, producing some 25% of the world's opium, forming part of the Golden Triangle. While
opium poppy cultivation in Myanmar had declined year-on-year since 2015, cultivation area increased by 33% totalling 40,100 ha (99,000 acres) alongside an 88% increase in yield potential to 790 t (780 long tons; 870 short tons) in 2022 according to latest data from the
United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) Myanmar Opium Survey 2022. The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime has also warned that opium production in Myanmar may rise again if the economic crunch brought on by COVID-19 and the country's
2021 Myanmar coup d'état persists, with significant public health and security consequences for much of Asia. (
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