Canada fully legalizes marijuana

Canadian Health Minister Jane Philpott The

full legalization of marijuana was one of the main election theses of the current Prime Minister Justin Trudeau. And now it's time to keep the promise. Canadian Health Minister Jane Philpott, speaking at a special session of the UN General Assembly, announced the full legalization of marijuana in Canada since the spring of 2017. The announcement was made on April 20, that is, 4/20, an important day for the “herbal” subculture of the whole world for reasons that no one remembers .

It is important to emphasize that we are talking about adopting a package of laws, including regulating the industry for growing and selling, the rules on taxation, excise, quality control, etc.That is, it is really a complete legalization - a large amount of work, and not just the decriminalization of cannabis, which could have been done in a couple of days, simply by deleting the relevant articles from the code on administrative and criminal violations.

Justin Trudeau used to emphasize that it is important to move from the current system to legalization right away, bypassing the decriminalization stage, in order not to finance criminal elements and not to encourage underground trade. Everything must take place under strict state control.

“This is a big job. It is very important to do it right. To do this, we develop regulations that take into account the rules for growing, distributing, retailing and using marijuana, and we want to make sure that they are based on the best recommendations of experts, ”said Bill Blair, parliamentary secretary of the Minister of Justice of Canada, who is responsible for the legalization project.

After the adoption of legislation in the spring of 2017, marijuana will become much more accessible to residents of Canada. For example, in Ontario, it will become even more affordable than strong alcohol, which is sold there only in specialized state stores until 21:00.

Now marijuana in Canada is allowed to smoke only for medical purposes, on prescription. Citizens who receive such permission have the right to grow marijuana at home for personal consumption.

Now Canada joins other countries: the Netherlands, Portugal, the Czech Republic, Spain, Uruguay, as well as the American states of Colorado, Oregon, Alaska and Washington, where the authorities also decided to legalize or decriminalize marijuana.