30 November 2015

Summary and conclusions of the report

The association of Dutch Municipalities (Vereniging van Nederlandse Gemeenten – VNG) wants to get the cultivation of cannabis out of the illegal circuit.

According to the VNG the production of cannabis has to be regulated in such a way that the authorities keep control on sale, consumption and production. A system should be established to issue municipal licenses for the entire cannabis chain. This is the conclusion of a report of a working group of the VNG that is presented today, according to the newspaper ‘De Volkskrant’.

The working group consists of seven lord mayors and one city counsellor. The report is a serious effort to end the failed ‘gedoogbeleid’, a policy that allows cannabis to be sold in coffeeshops, to be consumed, but not to be produced. According to the working group this situation is unsustainable. Taking out cannabis cultivation of the illegal circuit will mean a major blow to organised crime. The cannabis industry is strongly related to organised crime that is also active in the trafficking of xtc and of people, says De Volkskrant.

The working group does not wish to implement the two extreme solutions: liberalise soft drugs or completely prohibit them, but suggests ‘small-scale and market oriented facilities’. The sale points must become instruments for public health policies, ‘in stead of large and commercial organisations that many coffeeshops are today.’

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