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With So Many Canadians Smoking and Growing Marijuana, Many People - Including a Senate Committee -- Are Questioning Why the Federal Government Is Maintaining Its Prohibition Against the Drug.
Canadians will consume roughly 2,100 kilograms of marijuana today. This year, three million of us, according to a recent Senate study, will have smoked, eaten or inhaled almost 770,000 kilograms of the stuff -- impressive numbers considering marijuana use is a federal crime.
It is also a crime to cultivate the weed. Yet police and industry insiders estimate 215,000 growers across Canada produce more than 2.6 million kilograms of cannabis each year. In British Columbia alone, the pot-growing industry is believed to generate up to $6 billion annually, making it one of the West Coast's biggest industries, after forestry and tourism.
With so many Canadians smoking and growing marijuana, questions are being asked about why the federal government maintains its prohibition against the drug, and how, if the prohibition is sound public policy, police can ever be expected to properly enforce the law.
"Why doesn't the government stop dragging its feet and implement a fully legal regulatory regime for marijuana for everybody?" says Jody Pressman, a marijuana advocate in Ottawa.
Says Dana Larsen, editor of Vancouver-based Cannabis Culture Magazine, which sells 85,000 copies every month in Canada and the U.S.: "Under a fully legalized system, people could grow marijuana commercially and sell it in stores licensed by the government. It could be subject to health controls, quality controls and taxes. It wouldn't have to be more expensive than any other fruit or vegetable."
Such views are no longer the sole property of the political fringe. Two years ago, the Senate's special committee on illegal drugs interviewed 2,000 witnesses as part of the most exhaustive Canadian study of marijuana in 30 years. The committee's 2002 report urged the federal government to end its 81-year-old prohibition by implementing a system to regulate the production, distribution and consumption of marijuana -- the same as governments do with alcohol.
"If the aim of (existing) public policy is to diminish consumption and supply of drugs, specifically cannabis, all signs indicate complete failure," the report said. "Billions of dollars have been sunk into enforcement without any great effect."
Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON)
Author: Richard Foot, The Ottawa Citizen
Published: March 7, 2004
Copyright: 2004 The Ottawa Citizen
Contact: letters@thecitizen.canwest.com
Website: Ottawa Citizen
Canadians will consume roughly 2,100 kilograms of marijuana today. This year, three million of us, according to a recent Senate study, will have smoked, eaten or inhaled almost 770,000 kilograms of the stuff -- impressive numbers considering marijuana use is a federal crime.
It is also a crime to cultivate the weed. Yet police and industry insiders estimate 215,000 growers across Canada produce more than 2.6 million kilograms of cannabis each year. In British Columbia alone, the pot-growing industry is believed to generate up to $6 billion annually, making it one of the West Coast's biggest industries, after forestry and tourism.
With so many Canadians smoking and growing marijuana, questions are being asked about why the federal government maintains its prohibition against the drug, and how, if the prohibition is sound public policy, police can ever be expected to properly enforce the law.
"Why doesn't the government stop dragging its feet and implement a fully legal regulatory regime for marijuana for everybody?" says Jody Pressman, a marijuana advocate in Ottawa.
Says Dana Larsen, editor of Vancouver-based Cannabis Culture Magazine, which sells 85,000 copies every month in Canada and the U.S.: "Under a fully legalized system, people could grow marijuana commercially and sell it in stores licensed by the government. It could be subject to health controls, quality controls and taxes. It wouldn't have to be more expensive than any other fruit or vegetable."
Such views are no longer the sole property of the political fringe. Two years ago, the Senate's special committee on illegal drugs interviewed 2,000 witnesses as part of the most exhaustive Canadian study of marijuana in 30 years. The committee's 2002 report urged the federal government to end its 81-year-old prohibition by implementing a system to regulate the production, distribution and consumption of marijuana -- the same as governments do with alcohol.
"If the aim of (existing) public policy is to diminish consumption and supply of drugs, specifically cannabis, all signs indicate complete failure," the report said. "Billions of dollars have been sunk into enforcement without any great effect."
Source: Ottawa Citizen (CN ON)
Author: Richard Foot, The Ottawa Citizen
Published: March 7, 2004
Copyright: 2004 The Ottawa Citizen
Contact: letters@thecitizen.canwest.com
Website: Ottawa Citizen
