Demand for international meth supply rising

A 10-year report into New Zealand's rising P epidemic shows alarming trends in methamphetamine and drug consumption, pointing to a rising demand for international supply.

Meth seizures have been surging to new records each year, according to Massey University's Illicit Drug Monitoring System study.

In 2013 just 31kg of meth was seized by police and Customs while the next year, that was up to 99kg. It increased to 334kg in 2015.

But last year that record was smashed, with 941kg seized. Around 500kg of that came from a single police bust on a Northland beach.

However despite the report shedding more light on the P epidemic, police have now cut funding for it.

Three-hundred frequent drug users were interviewed for the study and a whopping 71 percent of them said they purchase methamphetamine at least once a week.

That's because the cost is dropping - driven by a huge increase in supply from overseas manufacturers, particularly Asia and more recently, Canada.

But the big change is how people are buying. While more than half of those surveyed bought drugs from gangs or dealers, 40 percent are now also purchasing on social media.

And much of that is synthetics, which have been growing in popularity as the cost of pure cannabis increases.

Ten deaths were linked to synthetic cannabis in Auckland last month and the study found the potency of the drugs had become far stronger since they were banned in 2014.

But while the decade-long research has provided police with crucial information on drug trends, Newshub can reveal the force is cutting funding for the $150,000 a year study.

Police say they're looking into other means of drug research, including wastewater testing. But researcher Dr Chris Wilkins says that's not only costly, but it doesn't provide key information such as who is using them.

"It really doesn't tell you anything about availability, it doesn't tell you about prices, it doesn't tell you about the frequency of use of different drugs," he told Newshub.

He's hoping to find other ways of funding the study, so 10 years of research isn't flushed away.

Newshub.