An arrest of 31 individuals and more than 1,300 pounds of seized hashish and cocaine were the result of the latest mafia drug bust by Italian police this week in the city of Rome. The amount of illegal drugs and number of accomplices involved in the bust only serves to underscore Italy’s on-going and seemingly never-ending fight against the mafia.

The mafia in Italy is known by many names depending on the region. In the South the crime organization is known as “Corona Unita” and in Calabria, where the busted drug ring had its ties, the mafia is known as the ‘Ndrangheta. The group, named after the Greek word for courage or loyalty, has a multi-layered structure which makes infiltration all but impossible. Headquartered in the southern region of Calabria, the ‘Ndrangheta has the reputation not only as the most powerful arm of the mafia in Italy but also as being the front-runner for the lion’s share of the cocaine market in Europe.

According to a Reuters news article, the ‘Ndrangheta consider Rome prime real estate when it comes to illegal activity. With Italy all but imploding under the weight of recession and massive unemployment, the ‘Ndrangheta all but look at Rome as the crown jewel in its mafia agenda.

That said, Italian police, together with tough prosecutors, have tried to bring the fight against illegal activity to the fore. Case in point: the Sicilian Mafia flexed its muscles for years as Italy’s most ruthless and powerful crime syndicate but has all but fallen apart thanks to anti-mafia interdiction. For its part, the ‘Ndrangheta took advantage of the Sicilian mafia’s weakness and has grown in size to establish itself as one of the most powerful cocaine importers in Europe.

An Associated Press news article pointed out that for the ‘Ndrangheta crime organization, the Rome marketplace is strategic and helps the clans accumulate criminal and economic power.

And lest anyone think that drugs and other illegal activity do not do brisk business consider this: according to a Reuters news article, in 2014 more money was made by the ‘Ndrangheta mafia from southern Italy than Germany’s Deutsche Bank and America’s McDonald’s franchise  put together with average revenues reaching nearly €53 billion ($80.5 billion U.S. dollars). Nearly half of that income was earned thanks to illegal drug activity with much of the remainder rolling in from Italy’s rampant illegal garbage collection and disposal business.

Comparatively, Italian task force officials say that typical mafia mainstays like prostitution, bribery and faulty construction, areas that historically have been big money makers, do not make nearly as much as illegal drugs like cocaine. In fact, collectively, other such illegal activity only earned about 1 billion euros in 2014.

All told, the southern Italian mafia, according to a recent study issued by Italy’s national anti-mafia task force, .ast year earned the equivalent of 3.5 percent of Italy’s gross domestic product (GDP).

With logistical outposts throughout Italy and abroad, the ‘Ndrangheta have looked to establish more of a presence in Rome as opposed to lesser hubs of criminal activity in Milan, Torino and Genoa.

In addition to the 31 nabbed suspects in Rome, four other individuals were arrested in Spain and yet another suspect is considered still-at-large.