In a cupboard-like police media room crammed with assorted furniture and filming equipment, Greg Williams has just been asked one question.
The head of our National Organised Crime unit will speak for the next seven minutes — in television interview terms an age.
Before the interview's done he'll have traversed the geopolitical factors and economics of meth supply, New Zealand gangs, how Mexican cartels see New Zealand as the "golden nugget" — a money making enterprise worth big money.
I'd asked him about Official Information Act figures from the National Drug Intelligence Bureau which show a massive spike in meth seizures for the first three months of this year as compared to the two previous years. Police have seized 428kgs of powder/crystal and 1.3 litres of liquid meth to March 31. Those narcotics seized from 331 incidents.
Those results dwarf both the results from the last two years combined. In 2021 41kgs was seized, in 2022, 17kgs.
The data reveals that liquid meth barely registered in those two years. But to March the police seized 1.3 litres across three incidents. The figures also have a fatal link connected to the death of Aidan Sagala, an innocent 21-year-old who drank a can of meth thinking that it was a beer.
So, the police have been busy.
And Williams winds into his work easily.
"There's been a massive increase in the production of methamphetamine across the world, so not just Asia now, and the Mexican cartels have always been but they're ramping that up.
"We're seeing in Afghanistan, we're seeing meth coming out of Iran, we're seeing meth coming through African countries, we're seeing MDMA labs in the Netherlands being converted into methamphetamine.
"We suddenly saw a surge of importations out of Canada. That is, in our view, the cartels sideswiping the US to Canada to then ship that down to be sold here."
While the global wholesale price has tumbled, in New Zealand gangs are keeping the price high.
Figures obtained by 1News only relate to police seizures and don't include the drugs netted by Customs. (Source: 1News)
"Our people pay somewhere around 80 to 100 dollars a point, around $400 a gram roughly. In the United States it's five dollars a point.
"We have these transnational crime groups sitting outside New Zealand that look at us and go 'Well I'm gonna have a piece of that'.
"I think we should be angry about what these people are doing in our community."
Australian expert John Coyne from the Australian Strategic Policy Institute says the root of the problem lies with those who've industrialised meth production — and no where is that clearer than along the Mekong River, he said.
"We should be incredibly proud of our border agencies whether they're across the ditch in New Zealand or whether they're in Australia. However the strategy itself is fundamentally failing because where the problem exits in the Mekong region is in the production.
"Somehow we have to impact either by reducing access to the precursors that are used to produce methamphetamine or alternatively by stopping that production in Myanmar."
Williams said his officers are getting better at working with international partners at sharing intelligence. He also singles out Customs as doing "stunning work" at the border.
The worst traffickers
But back to New Zealand's gangs.
Asked who were our worst traffickers, Williams doesn't hesitate. The Hells Angels are up there, as are a recent import.
"It is not a great surprise as to why 75 per cent of the Comancheros are currently in prison, because they have been up front and centre in trying to drive this business here.
But all gangs will have meth relationships.
"It's business so they might have feuds and often the things you're seeing with shooting and all that stuff. That's all business, that's 'I want to control this market', or 'I've got some deal that we're not agreeing on'."
* In a second part of this story on Wednesday, Yvonne Tahana looks at the role being played by Customs.
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