''It seems Shan State’s stigma of being the epicenter of narcotics production won’t go away easily even after nearly three decades of Afghanistan took over as the leader in opium trade in 1990, pushing Shan State to the second place until today. The period from 1950s onward until the 1990s was the era of opium refined heroin. But now in 21st century it is the crystal methamphetamine called “ice”. Recent International Crisis Group (ICG) report “Fire and Ice: Conflict and Drugs in Myanmar’s Shan State” pointed out that Shan State is the epicenter of this manufactured synthetic drugs, which again lent the area the stigma of narcotics center of production. “The trade in ice, along with amphetamine tablets and heroin, has become so large and profitable that it dwarfs the formal economy of Shan State, lies at the heart of its political economy, fuels criminality and corruption and hinders efforts to end the state’s long-running ethnic conflicts,” wrote the ICG report...''