A 73-year-old American man was arrested in Colombia this week for leading “cannabis tours” in his home.

Per CBS News, citing Colombian law enforcement, the unidentified man “advertised on social media and a website for foreigners to visit his house in Sabaneta, a town south of the city of Medellín in the northwestern part of the country.”

CBS said that the man “distributed flyers advertising ‘Cannabis Farm Tours’ given by ‘Cannabis Jimmy.’” 

“The materials said ‘free samples’ would be distributed during the tours. Approximately 2-8 people were on each tour, and reservations were required. The tours lasted 2-3 hours during which the man taught visitors ‘the process of planting, caring for, harvesting, and maintaining this plant,’ police said. He also sold tour-takers marijuana for $20 a gram,” the outlet reported. 

“Police said they confiscated 1,380 grams of marijuana during the arrest. They did not identify the man, only saying he is an American.”

Medical cannabis and industrial hemp are both legal in Colombia, but the country continues to impose a ban on recreational marijuana. 

But as CBS notes, the country has “long struggled to control the trafficking, manufacturing and/or possession of narcotics within its borders.”

“Late last year, the Colombian Navy intercepted a shipwrecked boat carrying 33 kilograms of cocaine and 744 kilograms of marijuana,” the network said. “The South American nation is the world’s largest exporter of cocaine – almost 90% of the cocaine sold in the United States each year arrives from Colombia.”

Lawmakers in Colombia considered a proposal last year to legalize adult-use marijuana and commercial sales. 

But in December, members of the Colombian senate “rejected the proposed legislation aimed to legalize adult-use cannabis in the country,” according to Forbes.

“The proposed legislation faced a setback in the Senate on December 12 during the plenary session in its attempt to regulate the adult use and commercialization of cannabis. During the plenary session, a proposal to archive the bill submitted by Senator Karina Espinosa from the Liberal Party right before the formal debate began received 45 positive votes,” Forbes reported at the time.

“Following the vote, Senator María José Pizarro, who spearheaded the project, spoke before the plenary session. She vehemently criticized the senators who supported archiving the project, attributing blame to the Senate for enabling organized groups to profit and condemning youth and consumers to the influence of illicit traders and drug traffickers.”

A different legalization proposal met the same fate in June, when the Colombian Senate voted down a proposal to allow the sale of weed.

Colombian President Gustavo Petro, who was elected in 2022, has spoken in favor of legalizing and commercializing marijuana in the country. 

In October, Petro recounted a visit to New York City, where he smelled marijuana burning wherever he went.

“Marijuana is sold today in Times Square,” Petro said, as quoted by Marijuana Moment. “It smelled on all the streets, all the way around the corner, and they sold it…like any other product. I suppose they charge taxes and that New York City or the state of New York lives partially from them.”

Petro, Colombia’s first leftist president, went on to criticize the United States for its role in the drug war.

“That’s where the war on drugs began,” Petro said, according to Marijuana Moment. “How many people have been imprisoned? How many people have died? Because undoubtedly illegality brought violence.”

As one of the world’s leading producers of the coca bush, Colombia has long been associated with cocaine trafficking.

According to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, an estimated “63,660 of the country’s households were involved in the cultivation of that illicit crop.”

“This has led the Government and the international community to design an innovative programme that also addresses security issues. In 2012, the area under coca crop cultivation in Colombia fell by a quarter to 48,000 hectares (ha), down from 64,000 ha in 2011,” the UN said. 

“Experience has shown that it is not enough to eradicate illicit drug crops to bring about a lasting solution to the problem. This is why UNODC supports the Government’s efforts to assist farmers who give up cultivating coca bush through alternative development initiatives such as the Forest Warden Families Programme and the Productive Projects Programme. These initiatives ensure that former coca bush farmers have legal and adequate incomes. These rural activities are integrated into broader socio-economic development strategies and benefit rural, indigenous and Afro-Colombian populations.”

The United Nations estimates that “the area under coca bush cultivation in Colombia has declined by 15 per cent from 73,000 hectares in 2009 to 62,000 hectares in 2010.” 

“During the last decade (2000 to 2010), cultivation levels have been reduced significantly by 62 %. These declines signal an advance of sustainable livelihood programmes and are due mainly to a combination of alternative development and law enforcement measures,” the report said.

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Ecuador’s newly-elected president has re-outlawed drug possession just a few days after taking power as part of a campaign promise to crack down on narcotics trafficking.

President Daniel Noboa announced Thursday, less than two days after taking office, that he would be changing the nation’s drug laws to once again make possession of small amounts of drugs a crime, walking back legislation enacted by Democratic Socialist President Rafael Correa’s administration about a decade ago. 

Previously, Ecuadorians were permitted to carry up to 10 grams of cannabis, two grams of cocaine paste (the raw materials made from coca leaves used to synthesize cocaine in a lab), one gram of cocaine, 0.10 grams of heroin and 0.04 grams of amphetamine. However, Noboa’s office opted to enact a zero tolerance drug possession policy on the grounds that to permit possession would encourage “microtrafficking.”

“What we promise, we deliver. Through the Ministry of the Interior, I have ordered the repeal of the CONSEP Resolution, thus removing the drug consumption table that encourages microtrafficking,” Noboa’s office said in a translated Facebook post. “In this way, we care for the future of Ecuadorian families and protect our children, girls and adolescents from the use of psychotropic substances and narcotic drugs.”

Narcotics trafficking in Ecuador, mainly cocaine, has been responsible for widespread violence, robberies, murder and kidnappings for years much like some of their other neighboring South American countries. There were over 4,600 deaths related to violence in the country in 2022 alone, according to Al Jazeera. In addition to trying to curb drug trafficking, Noboa also opted to direct his cabinet members to create programs that would offer rehabilitation help to habitual users and to additionally develop “coordinated information, prevention and control programs on the consumption of narcotic and psychotropic substances.”

The original drug possession laws made in 2013 were made to address what President Correa’s administration characterized as a public health crisis with respect to drug use. Correa directed the courts to somehow distinguish between people who were trafficking and people who were simply using drugs, hence the small possession limits. It was not immediately clear how Noboa’s administration would differentiate between traffickers and users, if at all. His predecessor, Guillermo Lasso, announced that he was going to repeal the laws in 2021 but never followed through. 

In a previous Facebook post on the day Noboa took office, Noboa announced that the “Drug Board,” which was the term used for the reference table of allowable drugs and possession limits, was on its way out signifying the end of legal drug possession in the country. He symbolized this by ripping up a piece of paper in a Facebook video. 

“Today the Drug Board is leaving! For our children, for our young people, for our families, for our country,” Noboa’s post said. “The New Ecuador is already here.”

Noboa defeated a protégée of Correa, Luisa Gonzalez, in the general election on October 15. Noboa will remain in office until May 2025. He is not serving a full term as president because he was elected to finish President Lasso’s appointment. President Lasso stepped down in lieu of having impeachment proceedings take place against him.

Violence soared in Ecuador during Lasso’s term as president. The violent murder rate nearly doubled during Lasso’s short reign as president, even to the point of presidential candidates opting to wear bulletproof vests while campaigning. 

“The Mission takes note that presidential candidates have had to resort to wearing bulletproof vests in order to campaign, a fact that limits their ability to move and express themselves in public spaces,” said members of the Organization of American States in a statement earlier this year. “The Mission reiterates its concern about the alarming climate of violence that has overshadowed the electoral campaign in Ecuador.”

Noboa’s term as president also kicked off with the announcement of his presidential cabinet on Thursday, which his administration touted as being composed of almost all women and young people. It would appear Noboa is taking a somewhat radical approach to leading a country that has been awash with violence and corruption for several preceding leadership terms. 

“I want to thank my initial work team who helped me bring together all these people with special qualities. They all  have the courage, the conviction, the strength to serve the country at its worst possible moment. That is not easy, that requires an additional degree of patriotism and empathy towards the  Ecuadorian people.”

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Pablo Escobar died of a gunshot wound during a 1993 shootout at his hideout in Medellin, but Pablo did not go down without leaving a very strange parting gift to his homeland: a bunch of hippos that escaped his private zoo, became feral and started terrorizing Colombian fishing towns. 

Colombia is planning a ”cull,” a word which means the selective slaughter of certain animals, of a portion of the 166 hippos descended from four hippos which escaped from Escobar’s compound after his death. The animals have taken over a large swath of territory in the Magdalena River where they’ve been designated as an invasive species. They’ve taken over fishing communities and even invaded a school yard at one point but no one was killed, according to information published by the BBC. 

Environment Minister Susana Muhamad said the Colombian government would be working to sterilize about 20 of the hippos and they may also be forced to euthanize others. Hippos have yet to kill anybody in Colombia but they’re considered very dangerous animals. Adult male hippos can grow to be as large as three tonnes and BBC Wildlife estimates hippos kill about 500 people a year, compared to 22 killed every year by lions. Colombian scientists estimate the hippo population could grow as high as 1,000 over the next decade if measures aren’t taken to curb the population. 

“Obviously we feel sorry for those animals, but as scientists we have a duty, to be honest,” said Columbian biologist Nathalie Castelblanco to the BBC. “Hippos are an invasive species in Colombia and if we don’t kill some of their population now, the situation could get completely out of control in just 10 or 20 years.”

According to the BBC, hippos have no natural predators in Colombia and no shortage of natural resources to consume. Thus, the population has rapidly and exponentially expanded in recent years. The hippos were officially designated as an invasive species in Colombia in 2022, and were previously declared “interested persons” by the United States government in a somewhat bizarre attempt to prevent their eradication in Colombia. Indeed, hippos now enjoy many of the same rights as American citizens, but only on American soil as it turns out.

“The ruling has no impact in Colombia because they only have an impact within their own territories. It will be the Colombian authorities who decide what to do with the hippos and not the American ones,” said Camilo Burbano Cifuentes, a criminal law professor at the Universidad Externado de Colombia to the Associated Press in 2021. 

Other options for dealing with the hippos have essentially tried and failed to curb the population growth, including sending a number of them to zoos around the world and a previous round of sterilization. Those efforts failed to make a dent in the uncontrolled hippo reproduction, however, and Minister Muhamad said they must now as a government develop euthanasia protocols for the animals as a last ditch option. 

“We are working on the protocol for the export of the animals,” Minister Muhamad said. “We are not going to export a single animal if there is no authorisation from the environmental authority of the other country.”

Pablo Escobar was one of the most wanted men on planet Earth at the time of his death and peak of his cocaine empire in 1993. His purported crimes included countless murders, kidnapping, bribery, extortion and drug trafficking to name a few. He evaded capture for years. He even convinced the Colombian government to let him serve a short sentence in a prison he built for himself rather than turn himself in. Later on, however, he went back on the run to avoid being jailed in the U.S. and a $2 million bounty was put on his head. He was shot dead by police on a rooftop in Rionegro on December 2, 1993. 

Pablo’s 5,500 acre mega compound in Antioquia, which included his private zoo, was given to the poor and largely left unattended after his death. The hippos were allowed to roam free because they were considered too burdensome to deal with or capture at the time. There were also camels, zebras and giraffes in the zoo, though it was not immediately clear what happened to the other animals after Escobar was killed. 

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Ignoring warnings from my family and that internal fear monster informed by nothing more than movies about narcotraficantes, I board the plane for an adventure in Colombia. From the moment I see Santi’s welcoming smile as I wheel out of the baggage area, I feel my anxiety dissipating. This is going to be an amazing weekend with Wind Hill Tours, the brainchild of Damian Holman, a cannabis grower based out of Maine. He, his wife Sonja, and their business partner Santi have brought down two other “cannabis influencers” (Mary Pryor and Ace King) to assess the tour and to advise how to make the experience as amazing as possible.

Scooping our baggage, Damian drives us out to Finca El Huerto. As we pull up, I look through the open air foyer and directly out to the Andes Mountains. My mouth drops open as I walk onto the splayed-out ranch estate. Bougainvillea and other flowering trees and shrubs form a semicircle around the infinity pool. The rooms of the house encircle the trees and I instantly feel wrapped in a cocoon of nature’s luxury.

We relax, smoke some provided pre-rolls, and chat as the chefs prepare our first dinner. Damon tells me his vision for Wind Hill Tours as the first all-inclusive resort experience focused on wellness through the lens of cannabis. I advise him that he will be able to provide the best possible experience for his guests once his own cannabis grow is established. There is nothing like providing single-source quality as flower or hash. Though the industry is nascent—personal consumption in Colombia is decriminalized and a proposal to legalize cannabis for adults is currently in motion at the time of my visit in fall 2022—there are no growing conditions quite like those found in Colombia with its fertile volcanic soil and consistent 12/12 photoperiod. I open the pre-rolls and reroll them with rosin smeared on the paper.

That’s better.

At the crack of dawn the next day, I throw on a light hoodie, grab my already packed chillum, and pad out to the pool. I appreciate the lightly scented breeze that whispers through the valley songs of contentment. Facing out to the Maravelez Valley, I take a deep hit and surrender to the thick smoke which overtakes my airway, charges down into my lungs and blossoms into a pleasant warmth before sliding back through my lips. Almost immediately I feel tension releasing from my face. I had slept very well, but sometimes I need THC-laden moments like this to truly let go. The sun has just begun banishing the thick fog that had been blanketing the mountains when I finish the last of my chillum. I knock it firmly into my palm and allow the ashes to fall down before disappearing in the fragrant wind.

Our first stop is a coffee finca, La Pradera. We start on a small hike to the property, crossing bamboo bridges over rushing creeks, wild coffee bushes crowding the path, and other tropical flora. Santi gives us the coffee tour, plucking unripe, yet still potent, berries for our sweet sucking pleasure. Upstairs at the coffee terrace, we sip perfectly prepared coffee, appreciate the mountains, and enjoy the sweet sounds of salsa and merengue.

Newly charged with caffeine we head over to the cannabis farm, IQ&A. We are warmly welcomed and sensing our haste, the team hustles us into blue scrubs and head coverings before ushering us into the greenhouse. My face alights with joy seeing these wonderfully healthy plants. Although each household in Colombia can grow up to 20 THC plants, this legal grow is strictly CBD. We sashay through the rows; admiring the bountiful life and delight in the various terpene rich varieties. The grow is as impressive as any in California’s Emerald Triangle. We finish off the tour in a lofty perch, smoking chillum and talking about the amazing view of the Andes.

Sunday morning finds me laying by the pool and puffing flower and rosin in my chillum before it is time for yoga with Jimy Betancurt. I slide through the poses with ease as I am in the zone; uncaring of any of life’s trivialities. Jimy assures us that with proper breathing and technique, we can achieve the same state of oneness and stillness that we get from our cannabis. I believe him, but I take another puff just in case.

A few hours later, we pass around joints of Cholado, Bubblegum, and Bubba Kush as we head for Salento, a small town known for its wild color; as if some larger than life artist had selected all of the doors, shutters, tiles, and window sills, and splashed every surface with a different hue. We traipse through the town and up 242 stairs directly to the Alto de La Cruz lookout which gives us the best view of the town. The combination of the glaring pigments, the sun beating from above, and the effects of several joints has my head swimming in surreal, slightly off kilter awe.

After a much-needed lunch, and under a persistent mist, we make our way to the nearby Valle de Corcora. We are looking to see the tallest wax palms in the world. As the Jeep barrels steadily down the road, trees and grasses sporting the most verdant leaves reach out to further entice our senses. Between the grand flora, we get glimpses of wild horses running with wild abandon; oblivious to our wide eyed stares. A few waterfalls punctuate the grand landscape.

We arrive at the valley under relentless rain and I look at the proposed hiking path dubiously as the sodden ground squelches with every step. I awkwardly slip and slide my way over the fairly steep course and just when I am exhausted from the thigh workout (and mentally pooped from the lack of THC), I see the turnaround for the loop. It is a beautiful overlook of the valley and the wax palms, some of them 200 feet tall, stand erectly and in complete defiance of gravity. We have been advised not to fly the drone, but the view is just too tempting. Truthfully I too am ready to throw care to the wind and I take out a vape pen to replenish my endocannabinoid system. I plop down at the feet of a statue of Groot and I shake my head in wonder at all of the lusciousness of this whole endeavor. Colombia has been good.

This adventure has been a heady expression of nature’s beauty and bounty. As THC has coursed through my body, my mind has soared wildly; buoyed not only by the cannabinoids, but also the sense of wonderment as Colombia reveals its next fascination. I have spent my time in Colombia reveling in the psychedelic experience of smelling, tasting, hearing, feeling, and seeing everything in a larger than life way. In one weekend, Wind Hill Tours has made considerable strides in its mission to provide a safe oasis for personal rejuvenation through cannabis and immersion in nature, as well as contribute to a new narrative of all that Colombia can be.

This article was originally published in the March 2023 issue of High Times Magazine.

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A recent paper published in the European Journal for Chemistry explores the historical use of cannabis and its versatility. Entitled “From ancient Asian relics to contemporaneity: A review of historical and chemical aspects of Cannabis,” researchers Gabriel Vitor de Lima Marques and Renata Barbosa de Oliveira from the Brazil-based Federal University of Minas Gerais’ Department of Pharmaceutical Products, submitted the paper earlier this year in April, and it was printed in the journal in late September.

“From the Himalayan mountains to the South American coast, Cannabis, a general term for plants of the genus Cannabis, with thousands of years of contact with humankind, shows its versatility as food tools such as hemp, religious and hedonistic input, and other purposes through the millennia, according to the populations in question,” researchers wrote in the paper’s abstract. “In this paper, a review of the context of the use of Cannabis and its place in world history is presented, from ancient Mesopotamian relics, traditional Chinese and Ayurvedic medicines, to the reasoning behind the isolation and structural elucidation of three phytocannabinoids and the spread of Cannabis throughout the world.”

Researchers described cannabis as one of the five main grains used by ancient people, alongside rice, soy, barley, and millet. It was often used as food, but also for the creation of many other goods such as soap. The hemp stalk was used to make ropes for tools and ship sails, as well as to make clothing and paper.

Current archeological evidence of cannabis plant use dates back to 8,000 years B.C.E. in ancient Mesopotamia (today the region is Iran and Iraq), as well as 4,000 years B.C.E. where hemp rope material in present-day China and Kazakhstan. Researchers allege that hemp was frequently used up until the 19th century, where an estimated 80% of fabrics, candles, rope, and more, were made with hemp.

It was also referenced in the world’s oldest pharmacopeia, the Pen Ts’ao Ching, which was originally compiled in the 1st century but dates back to 2,700 B.C.E. As translated by researchers, “The Ma-fen (‘fruit’ of cannabis)’ if ingested in excess, can cause the user to see demons.” Cannabis paired with ginseng was also “believed to help necromancers achieve premonitory powers and enlightenment of being.”

The use of cannabis for its entheogenic properties is seen in India around 1,000 B.C.E. Hemp is described in the ancient Hindu religious texts, the Vedas, as one of the five sacred plants: “…it was believed to have arisen from a drop of amrita (sacred nectar) that fell from heaven onto the earth and was able to bring joy and freedom to those who used it,” the researchers explained. At the time, the most common variations of cannabis were bhang, ganja, and charas.

Cannabis was often used to celebrate events such as the Holi festival, and Durga Puja. “It is understood that marijuana is as significant and respected for these people as communion wine or sacred host is for Christians,” researchers added. “For its other facets, ayurvedic medicine used Cannabis practically as a panacea: as an analgesic, antispasmodic, anticonvulsant, anti-inflammatory, aphrodisiac and anaphrodisiac, appetite stimulant, treatment of female tract diseases, abortifacient, inductor of childbirth, among several other applications.”

The benefits and widespread use of cannabis and other herbal medicines and knowledge in these cultures were demonized by the Catholic Church during the Middle Ages, and its properties were “hidden and omitted” in European territories.

Between the 18th and 19th centuries, as Napoleon invaded Egypt, French army scientists studied local people using hashish, and later took samples back to France to conduct research. In 1840, one particular researcher, Jacques-Joseph Moreau, “tested different preparations [of hashish] on himself and his students to test its psychotomimetic properties, with the justification that he ‘saw in hashish, more specifically in its effects on mental abilities, a powerful and unique method to investigate the genesis of mental illness’. Hash making its way to France also led to its use by famous authors such as Alexandre Dumas, Charles Baudelaire, Théophile Gautier, and Victor Hugo.

Irish physician William Brooke O’Shaughnessy recorded his observations about cannabis “in the treatment of pain, convulsions, and vomiting resulting from infectious diseases such as rabies, tetanus, and cholera, diseases that were major public health problems in nineteenth-century Europe, were of great importance to Western medicine.” Cannabis’ properties as a “sedative, analgesic, anticonvulsant, and in the symptomatic treatment of infectious diseases,” eventually led it to be included in the British pharmacopeia. “What was previously almost restricted to use by African and indigenous slaves has now been adopted for therapeutic purposes by the white Brazilian society,” researchers commented.

Throughout the late 19th century to present day, researchers continued to study cannabis’ scientific profile and uncovered many truths about cannabis. Although research was hindered by prohibition more than 80 years ago, today’s comprehension of cannabis was possible because of its use by ancient people.

The paper’s researchers stated that the “hedonistic” use cannabis and other narcotics in the mid and late 20th century was perpetuated by “cultural and even religious movements, such as jazz, blues, the hippie movement, Rastafarian, the recovery of literature from the previous century, and rock’n roll, starring famous artists such as Bob Marley, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles and The Doors, whose works influenced popular culture to this day.”

“Cannabis is perhaps one of the greatest controversies in contemporary humanity,” the paper concludes. Despite the setbacks of prohibition, modern day research is well on its way to making up for lost time, with the plant’s use both as a psychedelic substance for medical or recreational purposes, as well as its continued use as a food and textile.

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A police raid in Santiago, Chile resulted in the seizure of multiple narcotics as well as the discovery of a Bitcoin mining operation, which local authorities said marked the first time such a glaring link between organized crime and cryptocurrency had been found in Chile.

According to an article in El Mostrador, a Chilean newspaper, the raid in which the mining computers were found was the third in a series of police actions against a drug trafficking group headed by Kevin Piña Catalán. Chilean Police say Piña has been operating as the de facto leader of a group that trafficked cannabis suspected to be purchased from gangs growing it in the Quilimarí Valley; as well as ketamine, cocaine, Ecstasy and other drugs. Police said the group conducted their illegal activities using multiple different houses in the area which is why multiple raids were necessary. 

The mining equipment was found at a raid conducted at a house in the La Cisterna commune of Santiago on September 6 and resulted in the arrest of seven suspects as well as the seizure of 43 kilograms of cannabis and 43 grams of ketamine. Ecstasy powder, ecstasy tablets and a pill press for making more tablets were also seized. Police said they found the Bitcoin mining operation in one of the bedrooms with 19 computers set up for cryptocurrency mining, only 10 of which were running due to the limitations of the local power grid.

“It is the first time that drug trafficking is so directly linked to the virtual data mining of cryptocurrencies,” said Subprefect Eduardo Gatica, head of the Southern Anti-Narcotics Brigade to local media. “It had not happened before in the country.”

Piña was not arrested at the house with the cryptocurrency equipment, but at a different location about a week prior on August 30. According to the El Mostrador article, Piña was in possession of 13 kilograms of cannabis, 71 grams of cocaine hydrochloride, two firearms and ammunition at the time of his arrest. A previous raid on August 5 also resulted in four arrests and the seizure of 1.3 kilograms of cannabis as well as vehicles. Subprefect Gatica said the operation “was divided into three phases, in order to achieve the total dismantling of this criminal group.”

“Our investigation was aimed at dismantling a group of violent crimes dedicated to drug trafficking that operated in the southern area of ​​the capital, which had links with different communes, such as La Cisterna, San Miguel, Buin, Pedro Aguirre Cerda, Cerrillos and Lampa,” Subprefect Gatica said.

Police said they have no way of knowing whether the cryptocurrency mining equipment was paid for with legitimate or illegal money and they also have no way of knowing whether or not the group was somehow laundering illegal drug money through cryptocurrency, but finding both in the same house certainly may indicate the two were at the very least related. Due to the anonymous and multi-layered nature of Bitcoin transactions, it is very difficult if not impossible for law enforcement agencies to prove criminal activity, or even to quantify how much criminal activity is taking place.

“Verifying the criminal origin of wealth held in or laundered via cryptocurrencies is very challenging. As such, the extent of the use of cryptocurrencies to launder funds obtained from conventional offline criminal activities is hard to determine,” said a 2023 report on cryptocurrency by Transparency International. “This is because in such cases, the cryptocurrency is not transferred from addresses that have previously been linked to criminal activities.”

To that end, cryptocurrency has been used more and more in recent years to launder money obtained through illegal methods. The report said it is often as simple as exchanging cash for Bitcoin at any Bitcoin ATM.

“…proceeds of crime in fiat currency are initially transferred into cryptocurrencies with no immediate indicators pointing to the criminal origin being visible on the blockchain,” the report said. “Consequently, the unlawful use of cryptocurrencies is now no longer restricted to ‘on-chain’ crimes such as blackmail scams or ransomware attacks carried out by cybercriminals who demand payment in cryptocurrencies. Nor is it restricted to use for money laundering. Rather, cryptocurrencies are now used to perpetrate all manner of offenses that entail the exchange of monetary value.”

As for Kevin Piña Catalán and his gang of drug traffickers, police told El Mostrador that the whole matter is still under investigation, including the cryptocurrency aspect and how it may or may not have been related to the other illegal activities. Authorities said those arrested faced a plethora of different charges including drug trafficking, money laundering and ammunition trafficking.

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Colombia broke a new record for cultivating the coca leaf, the plant used to make cocaine, according to a United Nations report. The process involves extracting alkaloids from the leaves using solvents like gasoline. This crude extract turns into a coca base by mixing it with alkaline solutions. Then, with a bit of further refinement, thanks to chemicals like hydrochloric acid, the result is crystalline cocaine hydrochloride. The final product is dried, diluted, packaged, and ready for distribution (and likely stepped on multiple times; one can only hope not with fentanyl) before hitting the illicit market. Colombia is the world’s top coca cultivator, producing 60% of the world’s cocaine, followed by Peru and Bolivia.

On Monday, The UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) reported that 230,000 hectares, or 568,340 acres, of land, were planted with coca last year, 2022, which marks an increase of 13% since 2021. 

According to Al Jazeera, Columbia’s potential cocaine output skyrocketed by 24% to about 1.73 million kilograms (1,738 tonnes), the highest number reported since the UN began monitoring the situation in 2001. Colombia has been the world’s biggest producer of cocaine for a long time and is under pressure from the U.S. and the world at large to implement changes to cut down on production. 

However, producing coca is such a valuable profession for so many farmers that it’s been challenging to implement changes. Distanced from the harmful effects of the drug made from the crops they grow, coca farming is a means of survival and a way of life for many Colombian citizens. The government has previously promised subsidies and other incentives to move growers away from the coca plant, but so far, officials have yet to follow through.

Colombian Justice Minister Néstor Osuna said that they’re “flattening the curve” and that the increase rate was much lower than in 2021, the BBC reports. However, the UNODC’s Leonardo Correa warned of a sharp rise in potential coca production in 2022.

“The crops that were young last year have now reached maturity and are now productive. In other words, the rate of growth in hectares is decreasing. But the rate of cocaine production is increasing,” he said.

Colombian leftist President Gustavo Petro has previously called the war on drugs “irrational.” He likes to call out poor politics on the topic, such as during his first speech at the General Assembly in 2022. In it, Petro said that the world’s addiction to money, oil, and carbon is destroying the Colombian rainforest through what he described as a “hypocritical” war against drugs, the UN reports.

“The forest that should be saved is at the same time being destroyed. To destroy the coca plant, they throw poisons such as glyphosate that drips into our waters, they arrest their cultivators and then imprison them,” he said. “The jungle is burning, gentlemen, while you wage war and play with it. The jungle, the climatic pillar of the world, disappears with all its life. The great sponge that absorbs the planetary CO2 evaporates. The jungle is our savior, but it is seen in my country as the enemy to defeat, as a weed to be extinguished,” Petro continued.

He has proposed his own ideas to fight the cocaine problem, such as directing enforcement on the drug gang leadership rather than the farmers, increasing social funding in production areas, and expanding voluntary crop substitution programs in high-production areas. 

On Saturday, Petro asked for an alliance among Latin American nations to secure a united front in the fight against cocaine trafficking. Rather than continue confronting the problem with what he describes as a “failed” approach, he also proposed recognizing drug consumption as a public health problem. 

“What I propose is to have a different and unified voice that defends our society, our future and our history and stops repeating a failed discourse,” Petro said in a speech that concluded the Latin American and Caribbean Conference on Drugs, held in the Colombian city of Cali.

“It is time to rebuild hope and not repeat the bloody and ferocious wars, the ill-named ‘war on drugs’, viewing drugs as a military problem and not as a health problem for society,” Petro added. 

The recent UN report shares that almost two-thirds of Colombia’s coca farms are in the southern regions of Narino and Putumayo, which border Ecuador. There has been a 77% rise in coca cultivation in Putumayo, alone, the BBC reports. This area is currently engulfed in gang-related violence. Additionally, roughly half of the coca comes from indigenous reserves, forest reserves, and natural parks controlled by drug cartels or other armed groups such as leftist fighters and right-wing paramilitaries.

The Colombian government promises to adopt new drug policies soon directed at shutting down such criminal groups while protecting the farmers who grow the crop. 

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Chile, the country, not to be confused with Chili (the food), is the longest north/south oriented country in the world, stretching across 39 degrees of latitudes, giving it plenty of climates for growing cannabis, and the traditional drug of choice, coca leaf. While Chile legalized medical cannabis before any other country in Latin America and has the highest rate of cannabis use on the continent, they have not managed to finalize plans to decriminalize cannabis for non-medical use. 

Can You Bring Cannabis to Chile?

Before getting into Chilean cannabis laws, let’s talk briefly about if you can bring cannabis to Chile. While technically, it is legal to import cannabis to Chile for medical use, that exemption is really intended for Chilean citizens importing their medical cannabis; it is not an exemption to bring cannabis with you on a plane. While currently Chile’s Anti-Narcotics Law is being updated, with a November 23rd deadline for updates to be made, there is no expectation that it will become legal to bring personal-use cannabis to Chile from other countries. 

Long History of Hemp and Cannabis in Chile

Cannabis was not native to the “new world,” and the indigenous peoples of the Americas had no idea what hemp was until colonists and conquistadors brought it with them, originally for cultivation for fiber to make ropes and sails (critical for repairing damage their ships may have suffered on the Atlantic crossing). According to the book Marihuana: The First Twelve Thousand Years, “As early as 1545, hemp seed was sown in the Quillota Valley, near the city of Santiago in Chile.” Most of the hemp fiber produced in those initial cultivation experiments became rope for the army stationed in Chile, with any remaining fibers going to replace worn out rigging on ships that docked in Santiago. Eventually, there was enough of a surplus to send hemp fibers as far away as Lima, Peru, which was critical to the colonists there, as attempts to cultivate hemp in Peru and Colombia were failures. 

It is possibly due to this long history of hemp cultivation and use that Chile has “the highest levels of marijuana use in Latin America,” with 14.5% of residents saying they consumed cannabis in the past year (compared to 18% in the United States). 

Limited Medical Cannabis Program

Chile was the first South American country to have a medical cannabis program. In 2014, the Daya Foundation got approval for a trial grow of 850 plants to make medicine for 200 patients. The following year, Daya was able to scale up their cultivation to nearly 7,000 plants with the goal of producing medicines for 4,000 patients. With those additional plants, Daya’s cultivation is now the largest medical cannabis grow in all of Latin America, and is being tended to by over a dozen full-time gardeners. They anticipate harvesting over 2,000 kilos of bud, roughly 1/3 kilo per plant (almost a pound). 

Now Chilean medical cannabis patients have alternate options to the medicines produced in the country by Daya, and they can pick them up at two pharmacies in Santiago. The pharmacies are selling two products made in Canada by Tilray, distributed to Chile through a partnership with Chile’s Alef Biotechnology. Patients also can grow their own, but what they grow must be used exclusively for personal use by the patient.

Decriminalization in Limbo

Following quickly on the heels of Daya getting the green light to start the largest medical cannabis cultivation in South America, the lower house of Chile’s Congress voted on a bill to decriminalize cannabis for personal consumption. Before becoming law, the bill needed approval from a health committee and then would go to the Senate for a vote, but it has been stalled. Despite the lack of clarity around whether or not decriminalization was approved (some sites imply it was, others do not), medical use of cannabis in private is legal and there seems to be an attitude where if consumption is discreetly done in private, it likely will not result in legal issues. 

A New Constitution, New Chances For Legalization?

Following massive countrywide protests that rocked Chile in 2019 and 2020, Chileans voted for a new constitution convention. The goal of that convention would be to pass a new constitution to replace the one created in 1980, a holdover from Pinochet’s dictatorship. Cannabis legalization activists and observers have noted that the constitutional convention who wrote it appears to be supportive of cannabis decriminalization. According to the Daya Foundation, over two-thirds of the delegates at the constitutional convention “support effective decriminalization … of cannabis and home cultivation.” Unfortunately, Chileans voted no on the new constitution, leaving the old one in place for now.

Coca Leaf and Coca Tea Legal in Chile

Chile is one of the only countries on earth where coca, the plant from which cocaine is derived, can be legally used in the unprocessed form (the raw leaves are legal, cocaine is still very illegal). Chile has a long history of coca use, going back thousands of years. Traditionally, coca was consumed either as a tea or by simply chewing the leaves, these days it is most commonly drunk as a tea. Coca was ancestrally used as a treatment for altitude sickness by the people who lived around the Andean mountains and is still used by hikers and backpackers today. 

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This month marks six years since Uruguay launched legal recreational sales in the country, and newly released data illuminates how successful the cannabis program has been. 

The South American country’s Institute for Regulation and Control of Cannabis released the figures, which were detailed by Forbes.

Cannabis pharmacies in Uruguay “have sold 10,693,210 grams of marijuana between July 19, 2017, and July 19, 2023,” according to the news outlet.

“Currently, 61,509 registered individuals are eligible to access pharmacies for marijuana purchases. Moreover, there are three companies producing cannabis, and the sale of marijuana is authorized in 37 pharmacies distributed across ten departments throughout the country,” Forbes reported. “Moreover, there are presently 14,592 registered users for domestic cultivation and 10,486 members of cannabis clubs across 306 clubs.”

Uruguay made history nearly ten years ago, when it became the first country to legalize all stages of the cannabis process –– growing, sale and smoking –– in December of 2013.

Reuters at the time called it “a pioneering social experiment that will be closely watched by other nations debating drug liberalization.”

In fact, Uruguay had decriminalized possession of cannabis all the way back in 1974. But cultivation and sales of pot were not made legal until the passage of the 2013 law, which was framed as a bid to stymie the power of drug traffickers in the country. 

As Reuters explained at the time, although other “countries have decriminalized marijuana possession and the Netherlands allows its sale in coffee shops,” Uruguay became “the first nation to legalize the whole chain from growing the plant to buying and selling its leaves.”

Legal marijuana sales began in July of 2017, when the new law made “pharmacists into dealers,” as The New York Times put it. 

But as the Times explained back then, the new cannabis law’s implementation was not all hunky dory. The law had been “contentious for many Uruguayans,” noting that the “thorniest part of it — establishing a system for the state-controlled production and sale of marijuana — took years to work out.”

“Government officials worried that allowing a cannabis scene like the one in Amsterdam would make Uruguay a pariah among neighboring countries wary about legalization. So they developed an onerous registration process and ruled out marketing the country as a mecca for pot tourism. Under the law, only Uruguayan citizens and legal permanent residents are allowed to purchase or grow pot,” the Times reported then.

A report in 2020 found that legalization had not led to a spike in cannabis consumption among teenagers in Uruguay. 

The study, published in the International Journal of Drug Policy, found that there was “no evidence of an impact on cannabis use or the perceived risk of use” among youth in the country.

“Our findings provide some support for the thesis that Uruguay’s state regulatory approach to cannabis supply may minimize the impact of legalization on adolescent cannabis use,” the study said. “At the same time, our study period represents a period of transition: pharmacy access, by far the most popular means of access, was not available until the summer of 2017. Additional study will be important to assess the longer-term impacts of the fully implemented legalization regime on substance use outcomes.”

The study, which was billed as the “first empirical evidence on [the law’s] impacts on adolescent use of cannabis and related risks,” likewise found that there was not “an increase in student perception of cannabis availability” following legalization.

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An engrossing new story published on Tuesday sheds light on the impact of Peru’s exploding cocaine trade on the country’s Indigenous people. 

The story, published by Al Jazeera, opens with Fernando Aroni, a 41-year-old leader of a village of Amahuaca people, one of the Indigenous tribes in the Amazon Basin of Peru, arriving by canoe at a police outpost.

“Inside, dead bats litter the broken floorboards, and a sign on the wall bearing Peru’s national emblem, emblazoned with the words ‘God, Country and Law’ blisters and peels. The outpost stands at the 38th boundary line, a remote stretch of Amazon rainforest demarcating Peru’s border with Brazil,” the story begins. 

Aroni explains that the “police checkpoint has been abandoned for over 10 years,” and that absence has been exploited by drug smugglers.

“We’ve been forgotten by the Peruvian authorities,” Aroni told Al Jazeera.

More from the story:

“Along the untamed edge of Peru’s Ucayali department, the cultivation of coca — the raw ingredient in cocaine — is surging. A metastasised drug trade, once concentrated within the folds of the Andes, has descended into this lowland jungle region, threatening the reserves of some of the world’s most isolated tribespeople. Narcotics experts and Indigenous communities blame an anemic state security apparatus, whose absence along its borders has created “an open door” for the accelerating drug trade…Today, as the drug trade rips through this isolated frontier, the Amahuaca — along with thousands of other remote Indigenous people — are once again in the throes of invasion.”

Cocaine trafficking in the Andean country has soared in recent years. According to Reuters, Peru “seized a record 86.4 tonnes of drugs and illicit substances last year, 28 tonnes of which were cocaine hydrochloride.” Al Jazeera reported this week that, from 2021-2022, “the land used to farm coca climbed by 18 percent, reaching record high levels” in Peru.

In March, Peruvian law enforcement seized more than two tons of cocaine –– valued at about $20 million –– that was bound for Turkey. 

“This is the first incident that we know of (in which the cargo was in) Peruvian ports and its final destination was Turkey. Usually we are aware of ports in Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain and France,” said Colonel Luis Angel Bolanos, the police chief of the Peruvian port where the bust took place.

Last year, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) issued a report detailing “estimates of coca cultivation and potential cocaine production for the Republic of Colombia, the Republic of Peru, and the Plurinational State of Bolivia.”

“The Biden-Harris Administration is committed to continuing close cooperation with our partners in South America to address our shared challenge of drug production, trafficking and use,” Dr. Rahul Gupta, the director of ONDCP, said at the time. “As part of President Biden’s National Drug Control Strategy, we are pursuing policies that expand access to the continuum of care for substance use, go after drug traffickers and their profits, and also address the root causes of participation in the illicit economy in coca-growing areas, such as poverty, insecurity, and the lack of access to services.”

The report said that the U.S. “recognizes the Government of Peru’s commitment to reduce coca cultivation and cocaine production.”

“Estimated coca cultivation and cocaine production in Peru decreased but remained high at 84,400 hectares and 785 metric tons, respectively,” the report said. “The current level of coca cultivation highlights the importance of returning to pre-pandemic levels of eradication, while investing in a holistic approach that seeks to bring safety, security, and opportunity to rural Peruvians.”

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