Europeans spent at least 11.6 billion euros (£9.9 billion) in 2017 on illegal cannabis purchases, confirming marijuana as the largest drugs market in the 28-country European Union, the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) said in its 2019 European Drug Markets report. Illegal sales of herbal cannabis and its resin represented 39% of the EU’s drugs market, up from 38% in 2013, with revenues for criminal organisations dwarfing those in legal markets. Cocaine is the second most consumed illegal drug in the EU, with sales generating revenues of at least 9 billion euros in 2017, while the heroin market was worth more than 7 billion euros. (See also: Growing like weeds? Rethinking Albania’s culture of cannabis cultivation)

Le pétrole vert du Maroc fait saliver les nouvelles industries émergentes qui promettent des produits miracles à base de cannabis. Malgré les perspectives économiques prometteuses qui s'offrent au pays, le courage politique fait défaut à l'Etat et aux partis politiques, tandis que le peuple de l'herbe continue à fumer en cachette.  Enfin l’Etat, conscient des risques politiques de ces démarches, s’est enfermé dans son mutisme habituel, tout en poursuivant sa coûteuse politique de coercition vis-à-vis du trafic de drogue. La légalisation de la culture du cannabis passera nécessairement par une volonté politique d'en haut qui, par effet de "ruissellement", peut faire aboutir ce projet.

Hasta seis años de cárcel contra las personas que posean una cantidad de marihuana para su consumo propio mayor a la permitida, planteó en un proyecto de ley el congresista de Somos Perú Jorge Luis Pérez Flores. La iniciativa legislativa 5012/2020-CR, que lleva, además de su firma, la de otros 8 parlamentarios de Somos Perú, propone modificar el artículo 299 del Código Penal, y con esta modificación, establecer la punición de la posesión de marihuana y, en general, de drogas para consumo propio, invirtiendo así la naturaleza de la actual normativa. A la fecha, el artículo 299 del Código Penal no contempla la punición de esta circunstancia, según lo indica el mismo texto de la norma.

Many myths surround coca. Every day press accounts around the world use the word coca in their headlines, when they refer in fact to cocaine. TNI's Drugs and Democracy Team expose the myths and reality surrounding the coca leaf.

See also: Fact Sheet: Coca leaf and the UN Drugs Conventions

The City of Vancouver voted unanimously in favour of supporting a peer-led program that would help get a safe supply of drugs to individuals at high risk of overdose. Coun. Jean Swanson called for the approval of North America’s first compassion club that gives access to prescription heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine. Swanson said that given the overdose crisis, blamed on tainted street drugs, federal approval is needed for the project run by the Drug User Liberation Front, which has teamed up with Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users to host giveaways of substances purchased from the dark web — “so they won’t be arrested for saving lives.” (See also: Vancouver votes to support application that would create safe drug 'compassion clubs' | Toronto’s bid to decriminalize drugs hangs in the balance)

Legislators weary of Colombia’s whack-a-mole anti-narcotics efforts propose to stop the often violent trafficking of cocaine that has plagued the country for decades. The plan calls for the national government to take control of the drug market by purchasing coca leaf harvests and regulating cocaine sales. The challenges include cost, pushback from an international community that wants to maintain the status quo, and the potential reaction of an illegal drug empire that does not hesitate to use violence to get its way. The legislators who authored the bill, which is scheduled for congressional debate in October, insist the approach could reduce the waste of public funds, help protect Colombia’s environment and generate a better public health approach to the issue of drug consumption.

At 5am on a chilly Tuesday morning last month, 1,600 police officers and balaclava-wearing special forces, bristling with arms and battering rams, were ordered into action around the Belgian port city of Antwerp. More than 200 addresses were raided in what was the largest police operation ever conducted in the country and potentially one of the most significant moves yet against the increasingly powerful narco-gangs of western Europe. There are hopes that Operation Sky will herald the downfall of a generation of local bosses, although the Belgian and Dutch “godfathers” largely now hide out in Dubai and Turkey, hoping to be out of reach of the authorities. An incredible 27 tonnes of cocaine have been seized on Antwerp’s quays, in container ships and safe houses.

Colombia’s first leftist presidenthas been sworn into office, promising to fight inequality and bring peace to a country long haunted by bloody feuds between the government, drug traffickers and rebel groups. The incoming president said he was willing to start peace talks with armed groups across the country and also called on the United States and other developed nations to change drug policies that have focused on the prohibition of substances like cocaine, and fed violent conflicts across Colombia and other Latin American nations. “It’s time for a new international convention that accepts that the war on drugs has failed,” he said. “Of course peace is possible. But it depends on current drug policies being substituted with strong measures that prevent consumption in developed societies.”

La crisis que golpea a las principales regiones productoras de hoja y pasta de coca en Colombia completa ya siete meses. En este tiempo, cerca de 200.000 familias -según la Oficina de Naciones Unidas contra la Droga y el Delito, UNODC- que tienen como principal sustento esta economía ilegal, han resistido a la caída de los precios y la falta de compradores. El hambre, que no da espera, se asoma como el principal efecto de una larga lista que incluye la parálisis comercial por la falta de ingresos, un desplazamiento silencioso de antiguos cultivadores y el rebusque desesperado en actividades lícitas e ilícitas.

A new report in Denmark revealed that more young Danes are consuming cocaine. Now several Danish parties want to change the law on the drugs to allow people to use it for their own consumption. “Despite our ban and hard line on drugs, we see more and more young people using them. So we look to countries like Portugal, where the number of abusers and deaths have dropped in the wake of drug decriminalisation,” Sikandar Siddique, the spokesperson for judicial issues for Alternativet, told TV2 News. Last month, in Norway, the attorney general proposed a similar change to the law, stating that current policy has not had the desired impact.

La Policía Nacional Civil (PNC) informó que en Izabal fueron localizados arbustos de coca y un laboratorio para procesar drogas, donde prevalece el Estado de Sitio en todo el departamento. Esta es la segunda vez que las autoridades encuentran esa clase de plantación en menos de un año y medio en el país, porque casi solamente erradican sembradíos de amapola y mariguana regiones del occidente. No se ha detallado cuántas matas de coca están cultivadas en la Sierra Santa Cruz porque el operativo se desarrolla. Sin embargo, la Policía dijo que fueron encontradas en El Estor, y el Ejército que en Río Dulce. (Véase también: Localizan más plantaciones de coca y otro narcolaboratorio en Sierra de Santa Cruz)

As drug toxicity deaths and overdoses in Canada continue to soar to unprecedented levels due to the increasingly volatile illicit market, advocates and doctors are calling for more stimulants including cocaine to be part of safe supply efforts. “I would welcome the inclusion of cocaine, as well as methamphetamine, frankly, in safe supply programs. This is something that is urgently needed due to the severe risks associated with the illicit stimulant supply,” said Ryan McNeil, who researches drug use and policy in Canada as director of Harm Reduction Research at the Yale University School of Medicine. “Stimulants too often are an afterthought for decision-makers despite a rapid increase in stimulant-involved overdoses.”

The severe restrictions on movement and activities during the coronavirus pandemic had little effect on Europeans' appetite for illegal drugs in 2020, according to the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA). Cannabis use remained "stable" and at "high levels," said the EU agency in its yearly report. In 2020, it found, 15.4 percent of Europeans aged between 15-34 made use of the drug, mostly unchanged over 2019. The availability of harder drugs like cocaine also continued unchanged, notes the report, citing large seizures in 2020. In the case of heroin, it writes in a supplementary report, data from 10 hospitals shows "no overall change in the number of presentations associated with heroin between January and September 2020" when compared with the previous year.

A new drug-user advocacy group in Vancouver says the safe supply of prescription narcotics must include pharmaceutical-grade heroin and cocaine and — to kickstart the effort — they’ve started giving those drugs away for free themselves. Dozens of people who use drugs marched in the city’s Downtown Eastside and set up an overdose prevention site where they distributed free doses of cocaine that had been tested for fentanyl, carfentanyl, benzodiazepines and other dangerous contaminants. Organizers had planned to distribute up to 200 doses of free heroin as well, but existing supply lines have become so contaminated that they couldn’t find any. Calling itself the Drug User Liberation Front, the group also called on the B.C. government to make broad changes to the current safe supply guidelines.

Together with prevention worker Judith Noijen of the Jellinek Clinic, crimninologist Ton Nabben published the 25th edition of Antenne, a large-scale study of drug use. Using questionnaires, one-on-one interviews and drug tests, it paints a clear picture of drug use among youth and young adults in Amsterdam. Amsterdam is the only city in the Netherlands that measures the status of drugs and users so precisely. Nabben is in favour of regulation, whereby the government supplies the substance under strict conditions and provides targeted information. That would be feasible for MDMA, for example, the main component of ecstasy.

Vancouver police have arrested drug policy activists Eris Nyx and Jeremy Kalicum after executing search warrants on the Drug User Liberation Front office and their homes. Since 2020, Nyx and Kalicum have held protest events and operated a compassion club to supply tested heroin, cocaine and meth to drug users, despite the risk of arrest for breaking Canada’s controlled substances laws. Nyx and Kalicum said they were driven to break drug laws through firsthand experience of the overdose crisis. Vancouver police say Nyx and Kalicum were arrested so police could question them as part of an ongoing investigation. DULF has operated a compassion club for months and has frequently spoken to media about the specifics of the model. (See also: Study shows selling tested drugs saves lives)

The police busted and dismantled fewer synthetic drug labs and cannabis plantations last year, latest figures show. The number of discovered drug labs fell by 35 percent. The number of cocaine laundries, crystallization sites, and packaging sites was 63 percent lower. The police attributed the decrease to them arresting various drug gangs and criminal networks after breaking into encrypted phone services like EncroChat, Sky, and ANOM. Last year, the police also dismantled fewer cannabis plantations - 2,285 compared to 2,894 in 2020. This number has been falling for years. In 2017, the police dismantled over 4,600 cannabis farms. (See also: Fewer drugs labs dismantled as criminals are forced to change tack)

La coca se extendió por el campo colombiano porque reemplazó la reforma agraria que nunca llegó, y el narcotráfico se instaló en la política y la economía porque el sistema político del país fue tolerante a la circulación de esos dineros, dice el Informe Final en sus hallazgos sobre esta materia. “El actual paradigma de la guerra contra las drogas ha sido un fracaso”, dice sin rodeos la Comisión de la Verdad en sus hallazgos sobre el narcotráfico. Y lo ha sido, sostiene, porque, en términos sencillos, puso el énfasis donde no es: no produjo resultados efectivos para desmontar el narcotráfico como sistema político y económico, mientras el prohibicionismo criminalizó poblaciones y territorios, y “sumó un número enorme de víctimas en el marco del conflicto armado interno”. (Véase también: Acabar con el prohibicionismo: recomendaciones del Informe Final para narcotráfico)

Los datos del Informe Mundial sobre las Drogas de la ONU de este año "completan y complican aún más la imagen global que plantean los desafíos de la droga", según explica el director de la Oficina de Naciones Unidas contra la Droga y el Delito (ONUDD), Yuri Fedotov. En el informe se indica que hubo más muertes en 2017 por el consumo de drogas y que los estupefacientes tradicionales de origen vegetal, como la heroína o la cocaína, siguen en máximos, mientras proliferan los estimulantes sintéticos. Estas son las diez claves del Informa Mundial sobre Drogas 2019.