The US Cannabis media have discovered Lesotho…
Interesting enough in itself, but imagine if Nigeria decided to take advice from this project officer at UN Office on Drugs and Crime, as reported in their press, this past week.
Here’s a country that’s already a powerhouse producer of black market cannabis. Tiny Lesotho wouldn’t stand a chance.
The United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency on Monday approved the usage of Cannabis, popularly known as Indian hemp, to address medical related problems.
The project officer of the UNODC, Harsheth Lauren Virk, made this known during a public hearing on the need to check the rising menace of pharmaceutical abuse among youths in Nigeria.
According to Virk, Cannabis is a miracle drug allowed for medical purposes by the United Nations but not for recreational purposes.
She said: “Nigeria as a sovereign Nation has its stringent laws against it, but international conventions of the UN have approved it for medical purposes based on outcome of researches conducted to that effect by globally recognized institutes.”
She told the lawmakers that based on UN recommendations, aside cannabis, recreational users of other addictive drugs should not be criminalized but rehabilitated.
According to Virk: “The Drugs and Crime office of the UN sees addictive drugs users as people who are sick, in need of treatment, care and rehabilitation.”
She added that the Nation’s security operatives, particularly the Police, should be made to be proactive in approach against drug traffickers and not reactive.
In his presentation, the representative of the NDLEA, who is the Director of Technical Services, Femi Oloruntoba, explained to the lawmakers that drug users in Nigeria are not criminalised but drug traffickers or possessors.
We’ll be fascinated to see if more countries in Africa look at medicinal cannabis as a way of getting inward investment.
Dope magazine rolled out some interesting numbers in a January 2018 article reporting that, as of 2005, the continent has produced more than 10,500 tons of cannabis each year in 19 out of 53 African countries, according to a UN Survey.
Estimated to account for for roughly 25 percent of the total global production of cannabis. And an estimated 38.2 million African adults (7.7 percent of the adult population) use cannabis each year—far more than the world average of 3.8 percent.
According to the latest UNODC data, Africa is home to five of the top thirty countries for cannabis consumption among the adult population:
- #3 Nigeria: 14.3%
- #10 Zambia: 9.5%
- #14 Madagascar: 9.1%
- #25 Egypt: 6.24%
- #30 Sierra Leone: 5.2%
- In Morocco, the hashish trade employs more than 800,000 people, according to Bloomberg, and it’s worth $10 billion a year in sales.
- Malawi is known for high quality marijuana production, including the “Malawi Gold” strain. Plus, the country is now cultivating hemp on a trial basis.
- In Swaziland, prominent public figures have come out in favor of cannabis to help boost the struggling economy.
Source: https://www.dopemagazine.com/africa-cannabis-powerhouse/
