9 Countries That Could Be Next To Legalize Marijuana

(Photo: Fora do Eixo/Flickr)

Talk of marijuana legalization is taking place all over the world.

The conversation took off in late 2012, when Washington and Colorado voted to legalize marijuana, and only grew louder after Uruguay did the same in December.

While Uruguay is so far the only country to fully legalize marijuana, a number of others look ready to join.

1. Argentina

Argentina’s Supreme Court decriminalized personal possession of drugs, including marijuana, in 2009.

But legalization may be on the horizon. Last December, after Uruguay legalized marijuana, Argentina’s drug czar said his country should consider following suit.

2. Brazil

Personal drug possession is also permitted in Brazil, although traffickers are still punished.

But this month, a federal judge took the legal community by surprise when he acquitted a marijuana dealer and ruled the country’s marijuana laws unconstitutional.

While the decision is being appealed, some believe it could lead to a serious reconsideration of the nation’s marijuana policies.

3. Canada

With a federal election due in 2015, a lot of attention is being paid to legalizing marijuana. The leader of Canada’s Liberal Party, Justin Trudeau, has been an outspoken supporter of regulating marijuana like alcohol.

While Canada’s medical marijuana program is currently transitioning to a commercial market, legalizing recreational marijuana is now part of the Liberal Party’s official campaign platform.

4. Guatemala

President Otto Perez Molina was one of the loudest supporters of drug policy reform at the U.N. General Assembly last fall. In his address, the President of Guatemala praised Uruguay and the states of Washington and Colorado for taking a “visionary” approach to marijuana policy.

President Molina also announced that his country would undertake a study of alternate approaches to drug laws.

5. Jamaica

Despite a long cultural tradition of marijuana use, Jamaica has lagged behind more progressive countries when it comes to reform.

But just in the past year, medical marijuana has garnered significant support from top politicians, including the nation’s health minister. Changes in Uruguay and the U.S. have also given legalization activists new hope.

6. Mexico

Federal law in Mexico remains tough on all drugs, including marijuana, despite the flourishing drug trade that fuels local cartels. On the other hand, personal possession of drugs has been decriminalized since 2009.

More drastic change could be coming soon to the nation’s capital. This month, Mexico City lawmakers introduced a bill that would legalize the sale of recreational marijuana.

7. Morocco

The small African country happens to be the world’s top hash producer. In fact, hash is estimated to contribute as much as 10% to the nation’s economy, and many Moroccan farmers rely on marijuana crops to sustain their livelihood.

Now, two leading political parties have begun to discuss the legalization of medical and industrial cannabis as a way of stimulating the country’s economic growth and legitimizing the trade for farmers who depend on it.

8. Netherlands

The Netherlands has long been recognized for its liberal approach to marijuana. Since the 70s, coffee shops throughout the country have been permitted to sell marijuana to both residents and tourists.

However, many have been critical of the country’s failure to legalize production and distribution – creating a ‘back door problem’ that forces coffee shops to illegally obtain their supply.

With such an obvious hole in the law, it’s no surprise that mayors of 35 cities have come together to call for a fully legalized marijuana system.

9. United States

Federal law still considers marijuana as Schedule I substance. And despite President Barack Obama’s interesting comparison of marijuana and alcohol, there isn’t much sign of the law changing soon.

On the other hand, the kick-off of legal marijuana sales in Colorado has drawn significant public attention. Washington’s new marijuana laws will also come into play later this year.

Without a major disaster occurring in the two states, it’s likely that, over time, lawmakers will face increasing pressure to legalize marijuana on the federal level.

Source Leaf Science

Poll: One Month Later, More Coloradans Support Legal Marijuana

Colorado governor John Hickenlooper (Photo: Mike Johnston/Flickr)

A new poll suggests support for legal marijuana in Colorado has risen following the first month of retail sales.

Released on Monday, the Quinnipiac University poll shows 58 percent of Colorado residents support marijuana legalization. That number is up from 54 percent when the same poll was conducted last summer.

Amendment 64, the law that legalized recreational marijuana in Colorado, passed in November 2012 with 55 percent support.

On the other hand, 51 percent in the latest poll felt that marijuana legalization has hurt the state’s image. Only 10 percent said they had used recreational marijuana since sales began on January 1.

Indeed, even as the nationwide conversation begins to change tone, Colorado governor John Hickenlooper has shown little support for his own state’s position.

“I hate Colorado having to be the experiment,” he told local newspaper Durango Herald last month.

Ironically, Gov. Hickenlooper made a fortune as a cofounder of Wynkoop Brewing Company before entering a career in politics.

Still, Gov. Hickenlooper has acknowledged marijuana legalization in Colorado as “one of the great social experiments of this century” and, for his part, intends on seeing it done “properly.”

Source Leaf Science

NIH Survey: More Teens Using Marijuana, Less See It As Harmful

(Photo: KOMUnews/Flickr)

The latest national survey of drug use among U.S. teens shows that marijuana use has become more common, while its perception as a dangerous drug has not.

Published early this month, the 2013 Monitoring the Future Survey, conducted every year by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), found only 39.5% of high school seniors thought marijuana was harmful. Last year, 44.1% reported thinking of the substance as harmful, which was also in decline from previous years.

In a press statement, Lloyd Johnston, the principal investigator of this year’s survey, noted how drug perceptions can predict drug use, and suggested that both trends for marijuana may continue in the future.

“But more noteworthy is the fact that the proportion of adolescents seeing marijuana use as risky declined again sharply in all three grades. Perceived risk—namely the risk to the user that teenagers associate with a drug—has been a lead indicator of use, both for marijuana and other drugs, and it has continued its sharp decline in 2013 among teens. This could foretell further increases in use in the future.”

The survey also found 6.5% of high school seniors admitted using marijuana daily, reports TIME, up from 6% in 2003. Daily and annual use rates among other grades showed similarly slight or non-significant increases.

While government agencies like the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) have long voiced concerns about the negative impact of marijuana use among teens, rates of use have remained mostly stable over the past decade.

Interestingly, while marijuana has continued to be popular among high school students, both alcohol and cigarette use have declined.

Roughly 40% of high school seniors reported using alcohol in the past month, down from 53% in 1997, notes The New York Times. Daily cigarette use was reported by 8.5% of seniors and, for the first time in surveyed history, the percentage of seniors who reported smoking a cigarette in the past month also fell below 10%.

This year’s survey included responses from 41,675 students at 389 public and private schools across the U.S.

Source Leaf Science

Marijuana Contests To Join County Fair in Colorado

Pot at the county fair? Why not? Colorado’s Denver County is adding cannabis-themed contests to its 2014 summer fair. It’s the first time pot plants will stand alongside tomato plants and homemade jam in competition for a blue ribbon.

There won’t actually be any marijuana at the fairgrounds. The judging will be done off-site, with photos showing the winning entries. And a live joint-rolling contest will be done with oregano, not pot.

But county fair organizers say the marijuana categories will add a fun twist on Denver’s already-quirky county fair, which includes a drag queen pageant and a contest for dioramas made with Peeps candies.

“We thought it was time for us to take that leap and represent one of the things Denver has going on,” said Tracy Weil, the fair’s marketing and creative director.

The nine marijuana categories include live plants and clones, plus contests for marijuana-infused brownies and savory foods. Homemade bongs, homemade roach clips and clothing and fabric made with hemp round out the categories.

Judges will look only at plant quality, not the potency or quality of the drugs they produce. Other contests – patterned after Amsterdam’s famed Cannabis Cup – already gauge drug quality and flavor.

Top prize is $20, plus of course a blue ribbon. The fair already has a green ribbon – awarded for using environmentally conscious methods.

The entries will be shown in a “Pot Pavilion” open only to people over 21. Alongside the pot entrants will be 24 categories of homemade beer, four categories for homemade wine and one category for “spirits and liqueurs.”

Prizes will also be given for speedy joint-rolling, though fair organizers insist there won’t be any marijuana consumption on-site. Competitors in the live Doritos-eating contest will have to acquire their munchies elsewhere.

Even the photographs of the winning plants will be viewable only by adults 21. Organizers don’t want 4-H competitors in the popular rabbit and goat contests wandering by a pot display.

“We have a lot of families and kids at the fair, of course, and we wanted to be respectful of that,” Weil said.

Denver’s fair is far from traditional, though. Denver County didn’t have a county fair until 2011. Organizers wanted an urban, hip element alongside traditional fair favorites like a Ferris wheel and cotton candy.

There’s a speed text-messaging contest, and the highlight staple of a Western fair, a rodeo, has been replaced with a bicycle rodeo and a troupe of performing pigs. About 20,000 people attended last year.

The marijuana contests aren’t likely to spread to other fairs in Colorado. Officials in Routt County, in western Colorado, voted last year to expressly ban marijuana from its county fair.

And Colorado State Fair organizers have expressed no interest in marijuana competition.

California holds an Emerald Cup at the fairgrounds in Sonoma County, Calif., where guests with medical clearance are able to sample the drug. That contest is held at the fairgrounds but isn’t a part of the county fair.

Source Cannabis News

Eric Holder’s Pot Problem

Twenty states plus the District of Columbia now allow sales of medicinal marijuana, allowing pot prescriptions to treat pretty much any malady, from a headache to a hangnail. Colorado and Washington have legalized the drug for recreational use, too.

Yet federal law still prohibits the possession, use and sale of marijuana for any reason. This dichotomy explains why some banks are reluctant to accept the large amounts of cash that pot purveyors generate — even if the cash is legal under state law.

To redress this, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder has promised to issue guidelines to make it easier for marijuana sellers who are operating in accordance with their state laws to use the banking system. Large amounts of cash “just kind of lying around with no place for it to be appropriately deposited,” Holder mused, “is something that would worry me, from a law enforcement perspective.”

The fact is, Holder encouraged those bundles of unbanked cash to be assembled in the first place. Last year, perhaps in a nod to opinion polls showing that a majority of Americans favor marijuana legalization, he said the Justice Department wouldn’t seek to overturn the Colorado and Washington measures. Nor, he said, would Washington interfere with the 20 states that allow medicinal marijuana. Instead, federal drug agencies and prosecutors would leave it to local authorities to enforce marijuana laws.

All of which raises the question: When did it become acceptable for the country’s top law-enforcement officer to decide which federal statutes to enforce and which to ignore? Even those who agree with the broader policy of marijuana legalization should be left uneasy by open defiance of the rule of law.

Under the 1970 Controlled Substances Act, marijuana is classified as a Schedule 1 drug, which means it has high potential for abuse, serves no medical purpose and isn’t safe even under a doctor’s supervision. As recently as 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that, even in states that allow medical marijuana sales, sellers and users can be prosecuted.

Whether or not a law is outmoded, unpopular or overtaken by cultural change, the attorney general doesn’t have the authority to ignore it altogether in half the country. To do so is wrong, and has practical consequences: Holder’s pronouncement caused a surge of cash to flow from the black-market weed business into the regular economy. His guidelines presumably will make it possible for buyers to use credit and debit cards now — and for banks to accept those transactions — without fear of reprisal. But some banks won’t go along.

Banks are subject to federal banking laws, including the anti-money-laundering statute, which discourages large deposits of cash by requiring reams of paperwork to document where it came from and where it went. When regulators don’t enforce the rules, lawmakers haul them in, Holder’s blind eye notwithstanding.

What’s more, in states that allow marijuana sales, a whole new pot economy has grown up, complete with cannapreneurs, growers, equipment makers, transporters and even private-equity financiers. The National Cannabis Industry Association estimates marijuana sales will exceed $2 billion in 2014 and $10 billion by 2019. Nevertheless, a future president could wipe the industry out by regarding the federal prohibition as wise and strictly enforcing the law.

If that happens, the marijuana industry and thousands of employees would be put out of work or forced back underground. Banks would again refuse to accept their cash, dispensaries would have to unplug their ATMs, and Visa and MasterCard would refuse to process marijuana transactions. Sales of the drug would continue, of course, but they would again go untaxed and unregulated.

At any rate, guidelines from Justice wouldn’t be enforceable in court, and therefore wouldn’t provide the legal defense bank lawyers must have before advising their clients there is a safe harbor against prosecution. 

It’s time Congress recognized reality. With 22 states openly in defiance of the federal statute, lawmakers should decide whether to keep the national ban or turn the question of marijuana decriminalization over to the states. Congress could, for example, withdraw marijuana from the Schedule 1 list, recognize that it has useful medical applications and let the states decide whether and where to allow its use.

What shouldn’t be an option is for the Justice Department to look the other way.

Source Cannabis News

The ‘Yelp Of Marijuana’ Arrives On iPhone

(Photo: iTunes)

The guys behind Leafly have just launched a mobile app, and thousands of people are downloading it each day.

Leafly is a strain and dispensary finding service that has quickly become the poster child of the marijuana industry. Founded in 2010 by three programmers from California, the site also takes on the role of Yelp by allowing marijuana users to rate and review products.

The site has grown rapidly over the years, with legal marijuana expanding into more states. But with mobile browsing also on the rise, the company decided it was time to offer all of its web features through an app.

“Something that we did was really focus on the user experience and trying to keep that same Leafly user experience that people are used to with the website,” says Cy Scott, one of the three co-founders.

“The original app was over 2 years old and wasn’t optimized for newer iPhone and Android screens. It was also a lacking experience. You could browse strains and find dispensaries, but that was it.”

The revamped app launched last week and can be downloaded on iOS and Android devices.

With the update, users can now create an account, read blog posts, follow dispensary updates, and track personal usage in a journal. Scott describes the journal as one of the best features.

“Different strains affect people differently. If somebody says Sour Diesel has these effects and it’s good for this condition, maybe you have a different condition and it behaves a bit differently for you. So you can now journal that through the app.”

Other features are on the way, including doctor listings and multiple language support, Scott says, although they won’t be available through the app till early March. The company is also looking to expand into Canada and already has a French site set up.

Leafly’s dispensary finder on Android (Photo: Google Play)

Over the past three years, Leafly has had the help of a Seattle-based private equity firm called Privateer Holdings – and the MBAs that run it – whose main focus is investing in the cannabis industry.

The firm, led by Yale business school graduate Brendan Kennedy, made its first investment in Leafly in 2011, and has only recently branched out into other ventures.

That, along with the website’s attention to mainstream appeal, may have helped Leafly stay ahead of the competition.

“I think most of the cannabis-related apps are sort of lacking right now. There’s not much to model yourself after.”

Leafly’s main advantage is its active user base. Since launching the new version last week, Scott says, over 250,000 original app users have switched over. The website itself gets more than a million visitors each month.

And considering Colorado’s new laws, it’s no surprise that traffic has increased 50% over the last 30 days.

“Around the New Year, we saw almost double the traffic from Colorado,” Scott says. “A lot of people were looking at it and there was a lot of media attention.”

“Our traffic from Colorado is still higher than it was before the New Year, but it did slow down from that big spike we saw. We’re still seeing a lot of people searching Colorado from other states, who may be interested in visiting as tourists.”

Source Leaf Science

Seeing Green: Colorado Earns $1.2M In Marijuana Taxes In First Month

(Photo: 401K 2013/Flickr)

The first month of legal recreational marijuana sales generated at least $1.24 million in tax revenue for Colorado state, according to an analysis from NBC News.

Only 18 of the Colorado’s 35 licensed stores provided their sales data, some that had only been selling for a few days, suggesting that total taxes raised in January could be much higher.

Marijuana Business Daily estimates, based on NBC’s figures, total sales during the month were in the range of $8-12 million.

NBC predicts taxes over the year could add up to over $100 million, which would surpass the state’s estimate of $67 million.

In comparison, Colorado took in $40 million in taxes from alcohol sales last year and $166 million from cigarettes.

One reason why tax revenue is so high for cannabis is the rate. In Denver, state and municipal taxes add up to about 29% of the sale price.

Interestingly, Washington state forecasts its upcoming marijuana industry to generate $400 million in annual taxes, but that includes sales of medical marijuana.

On the other hand, Attorney General Eric Holder’s promise to adapt federal banking laws for marijuana has yet to be implemented.

As Fox News points out, until banks come on board, marijuana remains an all-cash business, meaning much of the potential tax revenue could easily disappear.

Source Leaf Science

Now Hiring: Colorado Company Will Pay You Just To Smoke Cannabis

(Photo: Open Vape/Facebook)

A vaporizer company out of Denver is looking to a hire a full-time cannabis specialist, whose primary task will be to test new products.

Earlier this month, Open Vape listed a job opening through its Facebook page for a “Cannabis Quality Control Specialist” who will “sample, evaluate and document details about our cannabis products.” According to the listing, salary will be determined based on “experience.”

While the job seems simple enough, Open Vape Vice President Todd Mitchem told The Daily Dot that the company is looking for a true expert on the subject.

Mitchem says that means someone who can, for example, tell the difference between an indica and a sativa based on smell alone, and someone who is familiar with all forms of cannabis, including flowers, concentrates, edibles and topicals.

The job also entails accurate, objective reporting of the user experience.

(Photo: CannabisEncyclopedia.com)

Open Vape makes vaporizer pens and cannabis oil cartridges that are sold in various dispensaries across Colorado. But with the kick-off of legal recreational marijuana sales, the company, like many others, is poised for expansion.

For instance, Medicine Man, a Denver-based dispensary that carries Open Vape products, is already seeing a boost in business from the recreational market. By this spring, the dispensary will undergo a $2.6 million expansion that will double its growing capacity and revamp its storefront, The Denver Post reports.

In addition to a standard resume, Open Vape is inviting applicants to submit a short video describing what qualifies them for the job. So far, the company has received over 1,000 submissions, which Mitchem says range widely from absurd to serious.

The deadline for those interested in becoming a legitimate Cannabis Quality Control Specialist is March 1.

Source Leaf Science

Alaska Could Become 3rd State To Legalize Marijuana

A campaign to legalize recreational marijuana in Alaska has gathered enough signatures to put the issue on the Aug. 19 ballot.

State officials confirmed Tuesday that the campaign had met the required 30,000 valid voter signatures.

The lieutenant governor’s office is expected to certify the wording of the ballot question in the coming weeks.

“I think Alaskans are watching other states, and they understand that the sky isn’t falling,” said Taylor Bickford, a spokesman for the Alaska Campaign to Regulate Marijuana.

“The effect has been money that was benefiting criminal enterprises and drug dealers is being used to benefit the residents of the state.”

The initiative aims to establish a system similar to Washington and Colorado’s, allowing businesses to grow and sell recreational marijuana.

Adults 21 or older would be able to possess up to an ounce of marijuana and grow as many as six plants. Smoking in public would remain illegal.

Currently, marijuana is decriminalized in Alaska and residents can have a personal supply of up to 4 ounces in their homes.

The state is also one of 20 that have legalized medical marijuana. However, medical marijuana cannot be sold in stores and must be grown by patients or their caregivers.

According to a poll conducted in early 2013, 54% of Alaskans support legalizing marijuana.

Source Leaf Science