The licence among other conditions, specifies the maximum area in which the opium crop can be sown.

Meanwhile, a senior Afghan official said today that the government's new campaign to destroy the country's opium crop was making headway.

Farmers become less willing to give up their profitable opium crop.

From 1984 to 1988, a Myanmar-based diplomat said, the Burmese opium crop increased 40 percent a year.

Today the opium crop is worth in excess of $400 million legally and $7 billion illegally, after processing.

Without any multimillion-dollar aid packages, they have managed to empty the fields that once accounted for 75 percent of the world's opium crop.

The aid was to cover agricultural supplies and eventually some light manufacturing to supply jobs in areas where the opium crop is important to family earnings.

Officials say this year's opium crop may reach a record 1,200 tons.

In southern Helmand, the opium crop was very strong, but so many farmers grew it that the market was flooded, officials said.

Although some miss the 'beautiful flowers' from the opium crops, most see the replacement crop project as a success.