Organized crime groups have moved away from importing the deadly synthetic opioid fentanyl and now produce it primarily within Canada.
The report, prepared for Health Canada’s deputy minister and obtained by CBC News through a freedom of information request, outlines changes law enforcement has observed in the illicit drug market.
“Super lab interdictions across British Columbia, Ontario and Alberta suggest that domestic supply is more than adequate for the domestic market,” the report said.
The Public Health Agency of Canada estimates that approximately 44,600 Canadians will die from a toxic drug overdose between 2016 and 2023. Of the 8,000 overdose deaths recorded in Canada in 2023, four in five involved fentanyl.
“We’re seeing a clear shift in the fentanyl threat in Canada from being imported to being domestically produced,” Detective Inspector James Cook of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police’s organized crime unit told CBC News.
Cook says the change began around 2019, when the Chinese government designated fentanyl a controlled substance in May and imposed further restrictions on its production and export.
“This may have been the catalyst for the shift to domestic production of fentanyl and fentanyl-like substances that had previously been illegally imported into Canada,” the Health Canada report said.
This trend is also reflected in drugs. Seizure data collected by the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) In 2018, the CBSA seized more than five kilograms of fentanyl en route to Canada. Last year, the agency seized less than one kilogram, according to the CBSA. Health CanadaIt only takes a few pills of fentanyl to kill a person.
Detective Matthew Dugdale, from Hamilton police’s drugs and gangs unit, said the COVID-19 pandemic has only accelerated organised crime’s shift towards domestic production.
“In the early days of the pandemic, it was nearly impossible to import anything into the country, legal or not, so criminal organisations weren’t going to stop themselves from selling their product. So they came up with ways to manufacture this stuff domestically,” Dugdale told CBC News.
The Canadian Criminal Intelligence Service (CISC) reported in 2022 that organized crime groups have shifted from importing fentanyl-related products to manufacturing the drug domestically by purchasing chemical raw materials from domestic and international suppliers.
“[Eighty per cent] “Many of the chemicals used to manufacture fentanyl are unregulated and can be sourced in Canada or legally imported from China,” the CISC report states.
“Several [organized crime groups] They use private licensed companies to import the chemicals and precursors used to manufacture fentanyl.”
Cook said some legal source chemicals may be “unknowingly” diverted by chemical companies to the illegal market.
“They may be importing or stockpiling domestic sources of chemicals and not fully knowing where the final destination of those chemicals is,” he said, adding that the RCMP’s focus on precursor chemicals is to work with industry to prevent such diversion.
Detective Eric Halab of Hamilton police intelligence said fentanyl production has soared in Canada in part because some of its precursors are available domestically, while the raw materials needed to make cocaine and opium are only found in certain climates.
“[With] “In the case of fentanyl, ultimately you want to get the lab equipment and the precursors, and potentially produce it yourself, start to finish, anywhere in the world,” he said.
The U.S. Congressional committee Report this spring The Chinese government is said to be offering tax incentives to companies that export fentanyl precursors.
In recent years, the police Ontario, B.C. and Alberta Criminal groups have been cracking down on laboratories, or “super labs,” that specialize in producing fentanyl.
“We’ve seen them come in all shapes and sizes,” Dugdale said.
“I’ve come across laboratories hidden in shipping containers and sea containers in rural areas. I’ve also found laboratories in residential buildings.”
TD Bank is at the center of a U.S. Department of Justice investigation into a massive international money laundering scheme. Andrew Chang analyzes what we know from court documents and inside sources to explain how the scheme unfolded and the red flags analysts point to.
Cook said most labs require a large investment, which shows how lucrative the illicit fentanyl market has become.
“This is not something that a high school kid in chemistry class could put together. It’s not just about sourcing chemicals and products to set up a lab. [but also] There are costs associated with that,” he said.
Cook said criminal groups often stockpile raw chemicals in different locations to avoid detection.
Last year, police across Ontario busted a fentanyl-manufacturing ring that included chemical storage facilities in Toronto and Vaughan, and labs in Stouffville and Smithville.
“They may be preparing and moving the product at different times as they transport it to the lab. They may be moving chemicals to a location and leaving them there for long periods of time, which poses a tremendous oversight challenge for law enforcement,” Cook said.
Canadian fentanyl leaks overseas
Dugdale said one worrying trend that has emerged since the pandemic is the sharp decline in street prices of fentanyl, by 30 percent.
“This leads us to believe that an oversupply of fentanyl in the opioid market is contributing to the price collapse,” he said.
A report submitted to the Deputy Minister of Health Canada pointed to a possible oversupply of fentanyl in Canada.
“It is widely believed that surplus products are being exported to highly lucrative international markets,” the memo said.
In 2022, Australian border officials seize 11 kilos of fentanyl It is believed to have originated in Canada. Since the beginning of 2021, The U.S. Border Patrol seized about 25 kilograms of fentanyl. The amounts coming in from the northern border are relatively small compared to the amounts seized at the southern U.S. border.
Cook said he believes most fentanyl export operations in Canada are fairly small-scale.
“Small quantities, primarily for personal use, are exported around the world, but primarily to the United States, and appear to originate from small-scale traffickers operating on the dark web,” he said.
Cook said beyond fentanyl, other illegal opioids are beginning to appear in Canada’s illicit drug market.
Two of those drugs are xylazine, a sedative for animals, and nitazane, a synthetic opioid estimated to be several times more potent than fentanyl. Cook said these emerging products pose “a huge challenge for government as a whole as we try to address this crisis.”
“It’s a constant game of trying to keep up with new drugs that come along,” he said.
