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opium poppy

opium poppy

1 6.1
A plant that has grey leaves and white or red flowers and is grown for opium
  • noun
  • /ˈoʊpiəm ˈpɑpi/
  • Specialized
translation icon : papa de opio
  • The opium poppy produces beautiful flowers that can be white or reddish in color.
  • opium poppy cultivation
  • opium poppy crop
  • growing opium poppies

Forget about growing weed in the mountains, growing opium poppies, growing coca leaves, bringing chemicals, cook them up in the labs.

Examples

  • The UK government, which has taken a lead on this issue, has set a target of a 70 percent reduction in opium poppy crops by 2008 and 100 percent by 2013.

    Academic text (2004)
  • Keywords: narcotics, opium poppy, oral history, political ecology, Turkey.

    Academic text (2011)
  • That was more than 5.25 million pounds of opium, the carefully collected and dried sap extruded from 4.8 trillion opium poppies.

    Academic text (1993)
  • As a result of the drought and the Taliban's poppy edict, opium poppy cultivation in Badakhshan has tripled between 2000 and 2004.

    Academic text (2004)
  • Farmers in Afghanistan depend on the income from opium poppy cultivation to support their families.

  • As a historic source of opium, the opium poppy has been grown in southwestern Asia for thousands of years.

Synonyms

Papaver somniferum
vsopium poppy
  • Specialized
9.6

A poppy plant grown for edible seeds and for opium used to make medicines

is the common name used in everyday language rather than the scientific label

Surface Forms

opium poppy singular
opium poppies plural

Morphology

opium + poppy

The meaning 'a poppy plant cultivated as the source of opium' is directly derivable from combining 'opium' (the drug/substance) with 'poppy' (a flowering plant): the first noun specifies the type/use of the poppy. This noun-noun attributive compounding is a common and transparent pattern cross-linguistically, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents will readily infer the meaning.

Etymology

Opium poppy is the name of the real poppy plant whose green seed pods, when cut, leak a white sap that dries into opium. So the name simply points to the poppy grown for 'opium', which people have used as both 'medicine' and an illegal 'drug'.