Silk Road forums

Discussion => Shipping => Topic started by: davebowman on November 09, 2012, 02:38 am

Title: Interesting Math I Did Looking at CBSA Stats
Post by: davebowman on November 09, 2012, 02:38 am
http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/agency-agence/stats/2012/q1/2012-q1-eng.html

This is interesting. I am reading the first quarterly report of the Canadian Border Services Agency for 2012. This is based on seizures made between  April 1, 2012 to June 30, 2012.


"Drug Seizures:
 Number of seizures:                        2,873
 Drugs seizures as a percentage of all seizures:    43.28%
 Total value of all drugs seized:                  $102,682,555.00"

This means the average value of each drug seizure is $35740.53.

The value of drugs is always highly overestimated by the police, however even if I presume that these values are inflated 50% the average value of a single drug seizure is still  23827.02.

I realize that most of these seizures are probably people importing by car, boat or plane, rather than through the mail. It would be prudent to assume that a smaller number of large seizures raises the average value of many smaller seizures.

"Top Seized Drugs:
 Drug       Number of seizures    Estimated value
 Cocaine            88                          $60,142,491.39
 Heroin            24                     $20,740,600.00
 Ketamine    12                          $ 7,526,541.37
 Opium       43                          $ 4,852,834.20
 Khat       432                          $ 1,971,217.07
 Crack         7                          $ 1,602,360.20
 GHB       4                          $ 1,415,450.00
 Hash & Oil    37                          $ 1,082,572.30
 Other Drugs    112                          $   680,833.35
 Morphine    7                          $   674,480.00"

Interesting. The number of seizures here adds up to 766. Much less than 2873. Perhaps these are the large seizures which raise the average. I add more columns and rows to this chart below.

 Top Seized Drugs:
 Drug       Number of seizures    Estimated value      Average Value per Seizure   % of Seizures by $   % of Seizures by #
 Cocaine     88                           $ 60,142,491.39      $683,437.40                 57.730%         11.480%
 Heroin        24                          $ 20,740,600.00      $864,191.66                 20.590%          3.130%
 Ketamine    12                          $  7,526,541.37      $627,211.78                  7.470%          1.560%
 Opium       43                          $  4,852,834.20      $112,856.61                  4.810%          5.610%
 Khat       432                          $  1,971,217.07      $  4,563.00                  1.950%         56.390%
 Crack         7                          $  1,602,360.20      $228,908.60                  1.590%          0.009%
 GHB       4                          $  1,415,450.00      $353,862.50                  1.400%          0.005%
 Hash & Oil    37                           $  1,082,572.30      $ 29,258.71                  1.070%          4.830%
 Other Drugs    112                          $    680,833.35      $  6,078.87                  0.006%         14.62%
 Morphine    7                           $    674,480.00      $ 96,354.28                  0.006%          0.009%
 Total               766                         $100,689,379.00      $131,448.27                     100.000%             100.000%

Each of these seizures likely resulted in charges being laid against the importers.



Now if I exclude all this information from the first stats quoted:

 $102,682,555.00
-$100,689,379.00
----------------
 $  1,993,176.00

    2873
   - 766
   -----
    2107

So of the information excluded from that chart, the average value of the remaining 2107 seizures was $945.97.

This is much closer to the range of concern. If a seizure must be at least $2,250 to make it onto that big chart, (that was half the value of the lowest average, khat), then half of the 2107 must be in the range of $0-$1000 and half must be in the range of $1000-$2000 to get about $945.97. This is where we can get into trouble.

I do not know how many of these seizures were made as a result of mail inspection and how many by people attempting to smuggle drugs in personally. Of the ones seized from the mail I wonder how many packages passed customs in total in the same three months.

Under the facilitation tab this information is available:

"Commercial and Trade:
 Number of commercial releases:    3,671,640
 Courier shipments:          9,116,747"

I don't know what this means but I would assume courier shipments means mail.
Title: Re: Interesting Math I Did Looking at CBSA Stats
Post by: trc on November 09, 2012, 02:54 am
Interesting info, their seems to be a very small amount of ketamine busts even though ketamine availability is way better than coke in most parts of Canada. Im guessing most dogs are not trained to smell it.
Title: Re: Interesting Math I Did Looking at CBSA Stats
Post by: unkn0wn_ on November 09, 2012, 04:09 am
Interesting. 2,873 seizures within a 4 month period sounds like a pretty high number.

But of course this is not strictly mail packages seized. Frequently it happens at airports, shipping ports and like you said at vehicle based border crossing.

You can see some of the highlights of the seizures in the media section: http://www.cbsa-asfc.gc.ca/media/menu-eng.html

They are mostly large seizures around 1 kilo, almost always in large shipments or people who swallowed drugs.

Interesting quote from the montreal mail centre:

"During the 2011-2012 fiscal year, CBSA officers at the Léo Blanchette Mail Processing Centre in Montréal made 1,645 drug seizures."

Also of note is the amount of Khat that was seized. I'm almost certain this is because the trucking industry in Canada is largely run by pakistanis/immigrants.

Reading through the media section, so many of the package seizures come from really suspicious places like Guyana, Jamaica, Haiti, Pakistan and even Iraq.

Either way, I'm sticking to domestic only and strictly small personal amounts.
Title: Re: Interesting Math I Did Looking at CBSA Stats
Post by: iamonion on November 09, 2012, 04:18 am
2 million CAD worth of Khat huh?  Sounds like a fucking tooth rot parteh!  (disguised bump for interesting information)