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Newly sworn in Colombian President Gustavo Petro is talking up the potential of legalizing marijuana, adding that it\u2019s time to seriously think about releasing people who are currently incarcerated over cannabis\u2014especially in light of reforms that have been enacted in U.S. states and Canada.<\/p>\n
The president has made clear the ending the drug war will be an administrative priority, and he talked about what a legal marijuana industry in Colombia could look like at a summit of mayors on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
He spoke about the economic potential of a legal cannabis industry, one where small towns in places like the Andes, Corinto and Miranda could stand to benefit from legal marijuana cultivation, possibly without any licensing requirements.<\/p>\n
He also signaled that he\u2019d be interested in exploring the idea of exporting cannabis to other countries where the plant is legal.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat happens if cannabis is legalized in Colombia without licenses?\u201d Petro, the country\u2019s first left-wing president, said, according<\/a> to a translation. \u201cLike sowing corn, like sowing potatoes.\u201d<\/p>\n Dijo @petrogustavo<\/a> sobre legalizaci\u00f3n del cannabis en Que sea legal, “como sembrar ma\u00edz, como sembrar papa” \u00bfQu\u00e9 opinas?pic.twitter.com\/ZECxE4j5oL<\/a><\/p>\n \u2014 \u00c1ngel Gonz\u00e1lez (@angelgonzalezvn) August 11, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n \u201cWe\u2019ll see if [cannabis can be] exported and we\u2019ll earn a few dollars because half of humanity [has legalized it],\u201d he said, somewhat exaggerating the current international cannabis policy landscape.<\/p>\n Petro said that he\u2019d want Colombia to become a competitive cannabis market, comparing it to Canada\u2019s legal industry. He also referenced the U.S., where marijuana might remain federally prohibited but most states allow it in some form and have taken equity steps to stop locking people up over the plant.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we are going to legalize cannabis, are we going to keep all those people imprisoned in overcrowded prisons, or has the time come to release many people from prisons simply because they were criminalized for something that is legal in much of the United States,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n A legalization bill championed by Colombian Sen. Gustavo Bol\u00edvar was introduced in July, and the senator said that the reform is within reach now that the country\u2019s Congress has a liberal majority of lawmakers who fit within a political coalition known as the Historic Pact.<\/p>\n \u201cWe had already presented it in the last legislature [in 2020]. It managed to pass in the first commission, but they did not put it in plenary because precisely the boards tend to manipulate the entire agenda and they never scheduled it for the entire [session] so it sank,\u201d Bol\u00edvar said, according<\/a> to Publimetro.<\/p>\n #MeGustaLaIdea<\/a> \u2014 Gustavo Bol\u00edvar (@GustavoBolivar) July 6, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n \u201cBut today, with that overwhelming majority, I hope that this alliance is programmatic and that all the parties that have joined the government coalition support it,\u201d he said. \u201cThat was one of our initiatives that are campaign promises also from Gustavo Petro.\u201d<\/p>\n As a side note, the CEO of a major U.S. marijuana company Flora met<\/a> with Bol\u00edvar and other Colombian lawmakers before the latest legalization bill was filed to offer perspective the main components of the reform proposal.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, Petro also recently talked about his views on ending the broader war on drug<\/a> in his inaugural address last week, emphasizing the need for the international community to unite around the idea that criminalization as a policy has failed.<\/p>\n He said that the status quo has fostered an environment of unregulated manufacturing and sales that has enriched and emboldened transnational drug cartels. Colombia has an intimate understanding of these problems as one of the chief exporters of illicit substances such as cocaine.<\/p>\n \u201cFor peace to be possible in Colombia, we need to dialogue, talk a lot, understand each other, look for common paths, produce changes,\u201d Petro said in his swearing-in ceremony speech on this month.<\/p>\n \u201cOf course, peace is possible if you change, for example, the politics against drugs, for example, seen as a war, for a policy of strong prevention of consumption in developed societies,\u201d he said, suggesting a public health approach to drug use that echoes arguments from advocates and experts around the world.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is time for a new international convention that accepts that the drug war has failed, which has left a million murdered Latin Americans during these 40 years and that leaves 70,000 Americans dead from drug overdoses each year,\u201d he\u00a0said. \u201cThe war on drugs strengthened the mafias and weakened the states.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe war on drugs has led states to commit crimes and has evaporated the horizon of democracy. Are we going to expect that another million Latin Americans will be murdered and that the number of deaths from overdoses in the United States will rise to 200,000 every year? Or rather, will we exchange failure for a success that allows Colombia and Latin America to live in peace?\u201d<\/p>\n U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern (D-MA), who chairs the powerful House Rules Committee, cheered the official swearing in of Petro, saying that he looks forward to \u201cworking together to\u2026rethink drug policy, and much more.\u201d<\/p>\n President Joe Biden, on the other hand, seems intent on perpetuating the drug war in Colombia, with U.S. military support. He released a memorandum<\/a> to the defense secretary on Wednesday that authorizes the \u201cinterdiction of aircraft reasonably suspected to be primarily engaged in illicit drug trafficking in that country\u2019s airspace.\u201d<\/p>\n He said that it\u2019s \u201cnecessary because of the extraordinary threat posed by illicit drug trafficking to the national security of that country\u201d and because \u201cColombia has appropriate procedures in place to protect against innocent loss of life in the air and on the ground in connection with such interdiction, which includes effective means to identify and warn an aircraft before the use of force is directed against the aircraft.\u201d<\/p>\n As a former member of Colombia\u2019s M-19 guerrilla group, Petro has seen the violent conflict between guerrilla fighters, narcoparamilitary groups and drug cartels that has been exacerbated by the government\u2019s aggressive approach to drug enforcement.<\/p>\n According to the United Nations Office of Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), Colombia remains a chief exporter of cocaine, despite<\/a>\u00a0\u201cdrug supply reduction activities in Colombia, such as eradication of coca bush and destruction of laboratories.\u201d<\/p>\n In 2020, Colombian legislators introduced a bill that would have regulated coca, the plant that is processed to produce cocaine, in an acknowledgment that the government\u2019s decades-long fight against the drug and its procedures have consistently failed. That legislation cleared a committee, but it was ultimately shelved by the overall conservative legislature.<\/p>\n Advocates are optimistic that such a proposal could advance under a Petro administration. The president hasn\u2019t taken a clear stance on the legislation itself, but he campaigned on legalizing marijuana and promoted the idea of cannabis as an alternative to cocaine.<\/p>\n Former Colombia President Juan Manuel Santos has also been critical of the drug war and embraced reform. In an editorial published before he left office, he criticized the United Nations and U.S. President Richard Nixon for their role in setting a drug war standard that has proved ineffective at best and counterproductive at worst.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is time we talk about responsible government regulation, look for ways to cut off the drug mafias\u2019 air supply, and tackle the problems of drug use with greater resources for prevention, care and harm reduction with regard to public health and the social fabric,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n \u201cThis reflection must be global in scope in order to be effective,\u201d Santos, who is a member of the pro-reform Global Commission on Drug Policy, said. \u201cIt must also be broad, including participation not only of governments but also of academia and civil society. It must reach beyond law enforcement and judicial authorities and involve experts in public health, economists and educators, among other disciplines.\u201d<\/p>\n Michigan Breaks Monthly Marijuana Sales Record In July, State Data Shows<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n Image element courtesy of Bryan Pocius<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n The post Colombia\u2019s New President Talks Up Marijuana Legalization, Freeing Prisoners And Exporting Cannabis To Other Countries<\/a> appeared first on Marijuana Moment<\/a>.<\/p>\n
Newly sworn in Colombian President Gustavo Petro is talking up the potential of legalizing marijuana, adding that it\u2019s time to seriously think about releasing people who are currently incarcerated over cannabis\u2014especially in light of reforms that have been enacted in U.S. states and Canada. The president has made clear theContinue Reading<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":458,"featured_media":56528,"comment_status":"false","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[81],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56527"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/458"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56527"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56527\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":56529,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56527\/revisions\/56529"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n
![\"🇨🇴\"](\"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/1f1e8-1f1f4.png\")
:<\/p>\n
Que se exporte y “as\u00ed nos ganamos unos![\"💵\"](\"https:\/\/cannabiscultivatornews.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/08\/1f4b5.png\")
” porque “en media humanidad es legal”
Que se libere a campesinos criminalizados por esto<\/p>\n\n
\u00a1Cannabis legal!
El 20 de julio present\u00f3 de nuevo el Proyecto de Ley q regula la Marihuana de uso adulto.
Con nuestras mayor\u00edas vamos a aprobarlo.
Dejaremos de matarnos por una planta q en USA produce 25.000 millones de d\u00f3lares\/a\u00f1o y mejora la salud del consumidor pic.twitter.com\/A2RgUvnuQZ<\/a><\/p>\n\n
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\nRead More: Colombia\u2019s New President Talks Up Marijuana Legalization, Freeing Prisoners And Exporting Cannabis To Other Countries<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"