The status of cannabis in the UN drug conventions is controversial. It is now scheduled among the most dangerous substances. How and why did cannabis in the conventions? Does it belong there? What are the options to review the status of cannabis according to current scientific data? Is making cannabis subject to a control regime similar to harmful substances like alcohol and tobacco a solution?
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Cannabis and Climate
The carbon footprint and energy use of indoor cultivation
Cannabis Policy Brief Nr. 2
October 2022Environmental impacts are rarely taken into account in the cannabis regulation debate. The assumption is that legal regulation would automatically reduce the negative environmental consequences of the unregulated illegal market, because authorities would compel the industry to comply with basic environmental standards. Practices in North America and the direction of the emerging regulation debate in Germany and other European countries, however, reveal a disturbing trend towards indoor cannabis cultivation. The high carbon footprint of indoor grow facilities could jeopardize policy aims to reduce energy use and to meet climate goals.
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The green wave hits Europe: Recent cannabis regulation initiatives in Europe
Side Event at the 65th Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) 14-18 March 2022
Tuesday, March 15, 2022
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In the last few years several countries as well as numerous subnational jurisdictions in the Americas have adopted policies to regulate cannabis for non-medical use as an alternative to prohibition. The reform of cannabis policies is proceeding also in Europe: Malta has partially decriminalised personal consumption and cultivation of Cannabis; Luxembourg’s parliament is considering reforms; Germany’s new coalition government announced its intention to legally regulate cannabis for non-medical use. In Italy a referendum was proposed but not admitted by the Supreme Court, aimed at the depenalization of personal cultivation and depenalization of all cannabis-related conduct.
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The Future of Cannabis in the Caribbean
Side event at the 64th UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs
Friday, April 16, 2021Two years after the presentation of the 2018 CARICOM report “Waiting to Exhale - Safeguarding our future through responsible socio-legal policy on Marijuana” at the CND, this years’ side event the organizers would like to share insights on progress made, regarding the public policies on cannabis and the development of a medical cannabis industry in the Caribbean region.
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A Sustainable Future for Cannabis Farmers
‘Alternative Development’ Opportunities in the Legal Cannabis Market
Martin Jelsma, Tom Blickman, Sylvia Kay, Pien Metaal, Nicolás Martínez Rivera & Dania PutriTransnational Institute (TNI)
April 2021Learn how lessening the barriers for small farmers while raising them for large companies can help to steer legal cannabis markets in a more sustainable and equitable direction based on principles of community empowerment, social justice, fair(er) trade and sustainable development.
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Position Paper of the Fair Trade Cannabis Working Group in the Caribbean
The Position Paper "For inclusive business models, well designed laws and fair(er) trade options for small-scale traditional cannabis farmers” produced by The Fair(er) Trade Cannabis Working Group aims to contribute to the debate on finding sustainable and realistic solutions to the challenges posed by the developing cannabis industry, with a special focus on traditional and small scale farmers.
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Rescheduling cannabis at the UN level
Here’s all you need to know about the WHO’s recommendations to reschedule cannabis and cannabis-related substances
Thursday, October 15, 2020Following its first-ever critical review of cannabis, in January 2019 the World Health Organization's Expert Committee on Drug Dependence (ECDD) issued recommendations to reschedule cannabis and cannabis-related substances. The Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) are set to vote on these recommendations in December 2020. Eagerly awaited, the ECDD recommendations contain some positive points, such as acknowledging the medicinal usefulness of cannabis by removing it from Schedule IV of the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotics Drugs and clarifying that cannabidiol (CBD) is not under international control. But the ECDD recommendations also reveal problematic underlying evaluation methods and scheduling procedures along with a very questionable rationale for keeping cannabis in Schedule I. Read more ...
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Cannabis Regulation and Development
Fair(er) Trade Options for Emerging Legal Markets
David Bewley-Taylor, Martin Jelsma, and Sylvia KayDrug Policies and Development: Conflict and Coexistence
12th volume of International Development Policy, August 2020Significant policy shifts have led to an unprecedented boom in medical cannabis markets, while a growing number of countries are moving towards the legal regulation of adult non-medical use. This trend is likely to bring a range of benefits. Yet there are growing concerns over the many for-profit cannabis companies from the global North that are aggressively competing to capture the licit spaces now opening in the multibillion-dollar global cannabis market. This threatens to push small-scale traditional farmers from the global South out of the emerging legal markets.
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Cannabis rescheduling
What could it mean for Africa?
Dania PutriInternational Drug Policy Consortium / Transnational Institute
Briefing Paper
June 2020READ MORE...In January 2019 the World Health Organization issued a collection of formal recommendations to reschedule cannabis and cannabis-related substances, these present an opportunity for African governments and civil society to further decolonise drug control approaches on the continent, as well as to strengthen the international legal basis for emerging medicinal cannabis programmes in several African countries.
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The Challenges of Medicinal Cannabis in Colombia
A look at small - and medium - scale growers
Nicolás Martínez RiveraDrug Policy Briefing Nr. 52
September 2019In July 2016, the Colombian government enacted Law 1787, which regulates the use of medicinal cannabis and its trade in the country. With this decision and a series of subsequent resolutions, Colombia joined the more than a dozen countries that have put into practice different types of regulation to explore the advantages of this plant as an alternative pharmaceutical. Even though the law stipulates that 10 per cent of production should come from small- and medium- scale growers, the reality is that most of the business has been dominated by large local and foreign investors.
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Cannabis regulation and local authorities in Europe
Bottom-up policy reform for cannabis regulation
Transnational Institute (TNI)
March 2019Local and regional authorities across Europe are confronted with the negative consequences of a persisting illicit cannabis market. Increasingly, local and regional authorities, non-governmental pressure groups and grassroots movements are advocating a regulation of the recreational cannabis market. The Transnational Institute (TNI) analysed possible cannabis market regulation models (in Belgium, Spain, Switzerland, Germany, Denmark and the Netherlands) to allow local authorities to share best practices and improve the understanding of drug markets as a means to reduce the negative consequences of illicit drug markets on individuals and society.
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