BOL: Coco Harvesting

LA PAZ, BOLIVIA - JANUARY 31: Unidentified Bolivians, including Aymara women in traditional clothes, gathering outside one of the buildings in the central coca market January 31, 2007 in La Paz, Bolivia. Coca leaves are a big part of Bolivian spiritual culture and society. It is chewed to ease hunger and fight altitude sickness and fatigue and is an ingredient in a lot of traditional medicine as well as in teas. It is used daily by a lot of Bolivians engaged in hard labour who often view it as sacred. For these reasons the country has often been on a collision course with the American policy of trying to eradicate coca as a means of fighting cocaine trafficking. With the election of former coca farmer Evo Morales as President it is not likely that the two countries will find common ground on the coca issue. (Photo by David Hogsholt/Getty Images)