Things move forwards, things move backwards

It looks as though the Canadian government will approve and pass this law either in 2018 or 2019. This is to be applauded as a most forward thinking and pragmatic move. Meanwhile, in Holland, it appears that the government are set to roll time back the way by 50 years by closing down any coffee shop within 250 metres of a school.

The rationale for this piece of nonsense apparently being to deter young people from cannabis initiation. This is in spite of The European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs (ESPAD) finding that prevalence of cannabis use in Dutch young people has decreased over the past five years, with this trend looking set to continue.

In the 1990's, there were apparently more than 350 coffee shops in Amsterdam alone; at the end of 2016, there were 175. That's got to hit the economy badly, as it's estimated that around a quarter of visitors to the city each year will use a coffee shop at least once. Here in the UK, the "will we, won't we" dithering game continues, as the Conservative Westminster government seem to be practically salivating at the prospect of the billions of pounds that could potentially be generated by the legalisation of weed, while at the same time never appearing able to get past the matter of how to legalise while simultaneously making sure that as much as possible of the money created is trousered by themselves and their (already super wealthy) friends, to be stashed away in offshore bank accounts.

However, it could always be so much worse... In America, as of this writing, everything still seems to be very much up in the air, as President Trump continues with his policy of jobs for the boys, among whose number can be found several fairly avid anti cannabis people (and of rather more concern, a number of climate change deniers and Christian fundamentalist wackos). Word from across the ocean, in those US states where weed is either currently legal or about to be legal, is that the cannabis community are trying to put a brave face on things, because as yet, nothing conclusive has been said regarding what plans - if any - there actually are.

However, many people do appear to be concerned about what the future holds for cannabis, particularly as President Trump has not, as yet, appointed his "Drug Czar". Considering some of his questionable choices so far, it doesn't look particularly good. There is a potential upside here. One cannabis farmer of my acquaintance who currently resides in Oregon made the point that if President Trump is really as serious about the regeneration of American production, creating American jobs and all the other promises that he's made, then the fledgling legal cannabis industry should have nothing to fear.

After all, there's the potential to create hundreds of thousands of jobs as well as bring billions of tax dollars into the coffers. On the other hand, should he decide to stop the industry in its tracks, then he will be pretty much be sending all those jobs and all that money to Mexico, where the drug cartels have seen cannabis prices plummet since American states began to legalise. The cartels would be very happy to fill any sudden gap in the market. But there's the problem. As yet, nobody actually knows anything. Should President Trump allow the legalisation process to continue unhampered, this may well have a positive impact on policy in the UK. We will continue to observe and keep you up to date with developments.

By: Dr Dee http://careofhealth.online/canada-is-set-to-legalize-the-personal-use-of-cannabis/ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/destinations/europe/netherlands/amsterdam/articles/future-of-coffeeshops-in-doubt-as-amsterdams-oldest-cannabis-cafe-faces-closure/ http://www.espad.org/report/trends-1995-2015/country-specific-trends