Pubdate: Tue, 19 Nov 2013
Source: Guardian, The (UK)
Copyright: 2013 Guardian News and Media Limited
Contact:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/guardian/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/175
Author: Jonathan Watts

HIGH HOPES: URUGUAY TAKES ON TRAFFICKERS WITH RADICAL PLAN TO 
LEGALISE MARIJUANA

Senate Expected to Pass World's Most Far-Reaching Legislation This Week

Inhaling deeply from a large joint of unadulterated cannabis, Marcelo 
Vasquez grins at the imminent prospect of his outlawed passion 
becoming Uruguay's newest state-sanctioned industry.

This week, the country's senate is expected to pass the world's most 
far reaching drug legalisation, which should transform Vasquez from a 
petty criminal into a registered user, grower and ultimately, he 
hopes, a respected contributor to society.

That would be quite a change. After a police raid this year, Vasquez 
whose home doubles as a marijuana nursery - was jailed and 70 of his 
plants were confiscated. But the court case that followed now looks 
likely to go down as one of the last cannabis trials in his country's history.

The marijuana regulation bill, which has been passed by the lower 
house of the Uruguayan parliament, will allow registered users to buy 
up to 40g a month from a chemist's, registered growers to keep up to 
six plants, and cannabis clubs to have up to 45 members and cultivate 
as many as 99 plants.

Vasquez, who smokes four joints a day, is delighted. "It's a great 
step forward that couldn't happen anywhere but here," he says. 
"There's a lot more to marijuana than getting high."

This is not just the spliff talking. With the new law, Uruguay will 
go further than any other nation in exploring the potential benefits 
and risks of marijuana. The government is designing a new set of 
legal, commercial and bureaucratic tools to supplant a violent 
illegal market in narcotics, improve public health, protect 
individual rights, raise tax revenues and research the medical 
potential of the world's most widely used contraband drug.

The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime estimates that there are 
162 million cannabis users - 4% of the world's adult population. Most 
countries have followed a policy of prohibition for decades, but 
there are signs of change.

Amsterdam's coffee shops still offer cannabis despite a recent 
tightening of the rules in the Netherlands. Dozens of US states have 
decriminalised or ceased penalising users of the drug. Washington and 
Colorado recently introduced a cannabis tax and California has 
steadily blurred the line between medical and recreational use.

But no government has put in place a structure as all-encompassing 
and supportive as that envisaged in Uruguay.

"We'll be the first country to have a regulatory framework for 
marijuana production, distribution, sale, consumption and medical 
research," says Julio Bango, one of the legislators who drafted the 
bill. "This is an experiment without a doubt and it will have a 
demonstrable effect. That could be important for the world because it 
could be the start of a new paradigm."

Uruguay is trying to bring the cannabis market under state control by 
undercutting and outlawing the traffickers. If the bill is passed, 
the government will arrange for a high-quality, legal product to be 
sold in a safe environment at a price that competes with that offered 
by illegal dealers.

"If one gram costs $1 in the black market, then we'll sell the legal 
product for $1. If they drop the price to 75 cents, then we'll put it 
at that level," says Julio Calzada, a presidential adviser and the 
head of the National Secretariat on Drugs.

Most cannabis sold in Uruguay is of poor quality and smuggled in from 
Paraguay. In future, the government will license firms to produce 
local products grown in monitored conditions, which will then be sold 
to registered users through pharmacies. As in the case of tobacco, 
cannabis suppliers will not be allowed to advertise their product. 
Following moves to legalise same-sex marriage and abortion, this 
measure is likely to reinforce Uruguay's growing reputation as a 
bastion of tolerance and progressiveness in Latin America. But 
President Jose Mujica dismisses talk of liberality. A reluctant 
advocate of marijuana regulation, he says that this is the only way 
to stem the tide of the illegal drug trade, which has had dire 
consequences for individuals and wider society across Latin America.

"This is not about being free and open. It's a logical step. We want 
to take users away from clandestine business," Mujica tells the 
Guardian. "We don't defend marijuana or any other addiction. But 
worse than any drug is trafficking."

Rather than liberalism, Uruguay's actions are better explained by a 
long and pragmatic tradition of market intervention and 
nationalisation. The state controls core energy and telecoms 
industries, it fixes prices for essentials such as milk and water, 
and it pioneered some of the tightest controls on tobacco in the world.

This small country also boasts an impressive record for drug 
seizures, with an estimated 10% of the total market intercepted by 
law enforcement authorities, compared with a world average of less 
than 5%. Until recently, Uruguay had avoided the epidemic levels of 
illegal narcotic trafficking that are far more pronounced in Brazil, 
Colombia, Peru and Mexico.

The country is winning individual battles, says Mujica  but 
systematically losing the war.

The growing popularity of pasta base - a highly addictive, crack-like 
drug - and an increase in drug-related murders has prompted him to 
act against the dealers by destroying their competitiveness in the 
biggest illegal market: marijuana.

By opening the door to regulation of cannabis, Calzada says the 
government has an alternative to the "war on drugs" approach, which 
has created more problems than it has solved.

"For 50 years, we have tried to tackle the drug problem with only one 
tool - penalisation  and that has failed. As a result, we now have 
more consumers, bigger criminal organisations, money laundering, arms 
trafficking and collateral damage. As a control model, we're 
convinced that it is more harmful than the drugs themselves."

But critics say that Uruguay is taking a huge risk that could result 
in a wave of new addictions.

"If legalisation goes ahead, I think the social damage will be 
enormous," says Nancy Alonso, who runs the Manantiales Foundation, a 
private addiction treatment centre. "Marijuana may seem innocent, but 
it is addictive, 15 times more carcinogenic than tobacco and produces 
psychological disorders including depression, anxiety and 
occasionally schizophrenia."

The public too have yet to be convinced. A Factum poll in October 
showed 29% approved of legalisation. Although sharply up from the 3% 
support levels of 10 years ago, this means the policy is still a 
potential vote loser.

Supporters of the measure hope hard data will win over the doubters. 
Once the marijuana business moves out of the shadows, its size will 
be clearer, monitoring will be easier and taxes can be levied and 
used to fund treatment of addicts and a more focused crackdown on 
harder drugs. Although the government is prepared to lose money to 
out-bid the traffickers in the initial stage, once the state has a 
monopoly, the potential revenues are considerable. The authorities 
estimate that 10% of adult Uruguayans - 115,000 people - smoke 
cannabis. Existing law permits consumption of "reasonable" amounts of 
marijuana, but forbids sales. The new law should clear up this legal 
contradiction.

The government will set up a Cannabis Research Institute, which will 
monitor the programme, handle approvals of seeds, establish policies 
for research and regulate the industry.

Many are eying new business opportunities. At street level, the 
passage of the bill is likely to boost shops selling growing kits.

But the big money is more likely to come from the pharmaceutical 
industry, which will be freer to develop and test marijuana 
painkillers and other treatments in Uruguay than in any other 
country. According to Bango, several big international laboratories 
have visited Montevideo to discuss possible collaborations or investments.

Juan Vaz, a marijuana grower and long-time legalisation campaigner, 
hopes the regulation strategy can be applied to other narcotics.

Vaz, who spent 11 months in prison for marijuana growing, says he now 
feels responsible for making the policy a success. "I will celebrate. 
It will be a victory. For many years we have been asking for this," 
he says. "Now it is up to us to make it work."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom