Global illicit opium production remained more than 70 per cent below 2022 levels in 2025

• Global illicit opium production remained at lower levels in 2025 at 2,100 tons, more than 70 per cent below 2022 (mainly due to Afghanistan’s opium ban) and almost 80 per cent below its 2017 peak.
• A doubling of opium production in Myanmar over the 2020-2025 period has not compensated the decline in Afghanistan, though it has made Myanmar the world’s largest producer over the 2023-2025 period.
• Global seizures of morphine (-60 per cent) and opium (-32 per cent) have fallen sharply in 2024 compared to 2023. Heroin seizures (-11 per cent) fell to their lowest level since 2002 and are almost 60 per cent lower than their peak in 2021, with heroin increasingly being produced out of opium stocks accumulated in previous years.
• In contrast, seizures of pharmaceutical opioids have increased strongly and were almost 130 per cent higher in 2024 than in 2020.