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Netherlands seeks to stub out 'cannabis tourism'
By Marcel Michelson | AlertNet | 23 Apr 2004 18:01:22 GMT

AMSTERDAM, April 23 (Reuters) - It's last orders for foreigners please at Dutch coffee shops as the government on Friday decided to curb "drugs tourism" and sharpen cannabis policies amid European pressure.

A trial will start soon in the southern town of Maastricht, just across the border with both Germany and Belgium, where the sale of soft drugs to foreigners will be banned.

"We want to end all aspects of drugs tourism, the fact that people come to the Netherlands to use soft drugs or to take them home," said Justice Ministry spokesman Wim Kok.

The liberal Dutch laws on soft drugs, whose use is not allowed but condoned in a tacit acknowledgment that there are insufficient police to arrest all offenders, have been a thorn in the side to more law-and-order-oriented European countries.

In the Netherlands, cannabis smokers can openly buy and smoke the drug in hundreds of government-regulated "coffee shops".

The centre-right government wants to call an end to the hordes of foreigners, mainly youngsters, on the streets of cities like Amsterdam prowling for a joint. Countries like France abhor the return of hazy-eyed nationals by train.

The Interior Ministry will work with towns and cities on ways to better enforce existing laws against the use of cannabis, including minimum distances between the so-called coffee shop cannabis cafes and schools.


"GROW-SHOPS" TARGETED

The Justice Ministry will attack drugs tourism with international police cooperation and target large-scale hemp growing as well as the "criminal involvement" of so-called "grow-shops" where people can buy seeds to grow their own pot.

The Health Ministry, for its part, will study the possible health consequences of soft drugs with a high content of Tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), an active compound in cannabis.

This study could lead to a reclassification of the high-THC content cannabis as a "hard drug", spokesman Bart Kuik said.

The Netherlands, where customers can order a vast array of cannabis from coffee shop menus, has reportedly seen a steep rise in THC levels in Dutch-grown cannabis called "Nederwiet" due to refined growing methods.

Some doctors say cannabis use increases the risk of depression and schizophrenia but its use has been widely tolerated by the Dutch for decades. Coffee shops are prohibited from selling "hard drugs" and are carefully monitored.

The Netherlands, the first country to legalise euthanasia, last year also became the first to make cannabis available as a prescription drug in pharmacies for chronically ill patients.

The government also decided to step up public awareness campaigns to warn against the dangers of soft drug use.

[zombienote: There's the DEA line now being spouted from Dutch Government people. Infiltration is moving along nicely.]

See also: Dutch Government takes a Giant Step Backwards

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Kannibal

As I read the article I see their motivation is to curtail drug tourism? Is their major problem drug tourism? I am not quite understanding what their problem is.Is it still legal to buy tobacco in Holland? How about alcohol?Considering the amount of health risks both those drugs present it just seems odd after decades of tolerance that the Dutch would want to return to the days of prohibition because they can't handle the tourism?


"We want to end all aspects of drugs tourism, the fact that people come to the Netherlands to use soft drugs or to take them home," said Justice Ministry spokesman Wim Kok.


Looks like they want to prohibit "drug tourism" is this the new health problem they pointing to for cannabis now?



The liberal Dutch laws on soft drugs, whose use is not allowed but condoned in a tacit acknowledgment that there are insufficient police to arrest all offenders, have been a thorn in the side to more law-and-order-oriented European countries.


More law-in-order oriented European countries? What I am missing here?


The Justice Ministry will attack drugs tourism with international police cooperation and target large-scale hemp growing as well as the "criminal involvement" of so-called "grow-shops" where people can buy seeds to grow their own pot.




I guess they can't really give any good reasons for returning to cannabis prohibition so the idea now is to wage a war against tourism brought about by the tolerance of cannabis?

What a sorry ass state of affairs.


Countries like France abhor the return of hazy-eyed nationals by train...


Would they prefer they fly or drive or take a bus? I've heard people stand around on street corners in France smoking a d00b.Having never been there I can't say if that is true or not though.I just thought that line above about the French abhorring hazy-eyed nationals returning by train was totally ludicrous along with he rest of the content of the article.

hauptmann

The Dutch certainly have nothing to gain by doing this, wont they infact lose alot of money in taxes and I'm sure their tourism will drop off drastically because of this.

But of course they don't mind people going to the Netherlands to use hookers. Pot tourism bad, prostitution tourism ok?

Solutions, I thought this wasnt going to happen?

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reggie_the_dog

I went to Maastrich last summer, it was great. Cafe Kosbar is great. Lots of Germans came to buy cannabis, Belgian people came too but I thought it was legal for them to do this now. Its a nice city, one can go Kayaking/Bicycling etc in the countryside, now they go and ruin it. Bastards....Maastrich will have a terrible economic problem now if this is true....

reggie_the_dog

one was quoted as saying

"Would they prefer they fly or drive or take a bus? I've heard people stand around on street corners in France smoking a d00b.Having never been there I can't say if that is true or not though.I just thought that line above about the French abhorring hazy-eyed nationals returning by train was totally ludicrous along with he rest of the content of the article."

I have taken the train to Maastrich, the bus to Amsterdam. Customs never hassled me because they just do random stops anywhere in the country and I am white so they leave me alone (sad state for non white people because the cops hassle them more).

People smoke cannabis on the street all over Paris, Montpillier, and Marsailles from what I have seen. People sell cannabis on the street in some places in Paris and many places in the suburbs, amoung people under 30 the regular use of cannabis is about as popular as the regular use of alcohol here. Occasionally the cops walk by, people put out their joints, then the cops pass and people relight. People roll joints in the street, hold a lighter to their hash to make it soft and then smoke fat joints in the street, in the subway stations, in the subway cars etc......

This new restriction is against the principles of the European Union. One country in the EU cannot deny other EU citizens access to stores and services open to their own citizens. Also we can just have locals buy us our weed and then smoke in the streets, perhaps next to schools just to be assholes!!!

 

WikingCanuck

About the France tolerance thing,

I was in France last december, while there I met a guy from Morocco who had a few grams of moroccan black hash on him. He just whipped out a gram of hash,lit it and began to roll it up with tobacco, right in the middle of the street, I was shocked{im from not so liberal Canada}and told him to put it away until we got somewhere more isolated, he looked at me and laughed. Later that day we smoked some hash cannons on the TGV and subway, no one seemed to care,one guy came up to us and asked for a puff.

Oh ya, this seriously does look like the beginning of the end of Dutch Cannabis Freedom, the Nederlands new government is pretty pro-american.
i.e:sending Dutch troops to Iraq{that's not very liberal,LOL}

solutions

Gee, where to start?

A while ago Justice Minister Donner proposed this ludicrous ban on selling cannabis to foreigners. In the Cannabisbrief the Cabinet sent to parliament last Friday it now says it "is researching the possibilities to make coffeeshopholders limit the sale of cannabis to non-residents to a minimum, and will set up an experiment in cooperation with the city of Maastricht to evaluate the possibilities".

The coffeeshop policy of a city is up to the local authorities, the Maastricht mayor apparently feels for such an experiment, but at the same time wants more money for this. IF this experiment goes ahead, it is still only the city of Maastricht (sorry Reggie). I would be real curious if there would be any positive effects, other than tourists moving to other border cities.

The Amsterdam city council would not support such idiocratic heresy, they adopted a resolution, calling for the legalization of cannabis cultivation. Here in Amsterdam there is no nuisance from drug-tourism. The 270 Amsterdam coffeeshops can easily deal with the +/- 120.000 tourists and 50.000 Amsterdammers who visit a coffeeshop per month (according to 2001-2002 data in dutch). According to the data-research 6% of tourists come to Amsterdam specifically for the coffeeshops and 26% eventually visit one.

So this threads title "The end of an era in Amsterdam" is a tad premature, if not utter nonsense. I would definately start a business if they banned foreigners from coffeeshops, money like water no problem

In border regions there does seem to be some nuisance though, with thousands of people a day visiting places with only a few coffeeshops. In the end it is up to these cities to make their own policy. The only real solutions would obviously be opening coffeeshops in Germany, Belgium and France. That would really cut back nuisance. Other cities take other measures, Venlo will open a big trucker style coffeeshop on the German border.

I remain quite sceptical about these measures. I highly doubt if it is possible within European regulations prohibiting discrimination of member Europeans. Perhaps it can be done legally, though I seriously doubt it.

On a brighter note: Today in the leading Dutch newspaper NRC Handelsblad under the headline "Nederwiet with high THC level not dangerous" an article that mentions a platform of experts known as the "Coordinationpoint Assessment and Monitoring new drugs" (CAM) that sent a letter to the Minister of Health saying a higher THC-level does not have a higher risk, if any only a slightly higher risk for novice smokers. It further mentions the University of Amsterdam's Criminology institute Bongers that called the Cabinets position "a worrying development"

edited to add: At least we're not killing cute little seals

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