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Dutch Coffee Shops Close as Authorities Weed out Drug Tourists
04-30-07|DW-World De

Each year, thousands of German drug tourists cross the border into the Dutch town of Enschede, where soft drugs such as marijuana are sold openly. Now, a government crackdown is forcing many coffee shops out of business.

A dense, sweet-smelling smoke fills the room in the De Molen coffee shop. Here in the Dutch city of Enschede, the streets are littered with places like De Molen, which openly sell soft drugs such as hashish or marijuana.

But dozens of coffee shops have had to close shop in recent months, reflecting a growing consensus in the Netherlands that the country's notoriously liberal drug policy is currently doing more harm than good.

Enschede has been particularly problematic for local authorities, because of its immediate proximity to the German border. Thousands of drug tourists, mainly from Germany, pour across the border each year for a taste of legal marijuana, a controlled substance in almost every country of the world -- including, technically, the Netherlands.

"Many Germans come to visit Enschede just because of our coffee shops -- that is a fact," says Enschede city spokesman Michael Haase. Indeed, the nearest coffee shop is located just 300 meters beyond the border checkpoint.

The limits of tolerance

The Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs has published a brochure complaining that shops located along the German border "frequently" cause trouble. And Haase says local residents are sometimes harassed by glassy-eyed drug tourists.

Enschede's drug trade has also become a liability for the border police, as drug tourists are regularly caught trying to smuggle the lucrative weed back into their home country.

But the last decade has seen a steady decline in the number of coffee shops, according to city officials. Eight years ago, Enschede counted 17 coffee shops; today, only 9 remain to serve the city's population of 155,000.

The number of coffee shops has declined nationally, as well, with nearly 740 coffee shops in 2004 compared to 1180 in 1997. Rather than a result of market realities, the decline stems from a concerted political effort to put a lid on the legal drug trade.

"Dutch local politicians have watched the drug tourism critically and have tightened the reins," says Christoph Boenig, spokesman for the cross-border network Euregio. And Michael Haase, the city spokesman, says "there is a consensus amongst all political parties" concerning drug policy.

Since 1999, local politicians in Enschede have had the authority to shut down coffee shops, even if there were no reports of trouble or disturbances.


Business as usual

But it is unclear whether the reduction in the number of coffee shops has actually resulted in a decrease in drug consumption and drug tourism; and not all the coffee shops have closed down. In the De Molen coffee shop, it is business as usual.

The De Molen serves fifty customers on a normal day, and twice as many on weekends and holidays. The staff there reports that the number of German and Dutch customers is about equal.

Each customer is allowed to buy up to five grams of soft drugs, ranging from cannabis products like hashish or marijuana to psilocybin mushrooms, a psychoactive drug that can lead to hours of hallucinations. The De Molen, like most of its competitors, offers several different varieties of marijuana.

"You can choose from many different flavors and strengths," a saleswoman explains. The cheapest is called "Ketama," and 0.8 grams cost five euros (ca. seven dollars).

But other varieties, such as "White Widow," have been engineered for maximum strength, containing as much as 25 percent tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the active ingredient in the cannabis plant. A few decades ago, cannabis varieties rarely contained more than 10 percent THC.

Revising the drug policy

This increased effectiveness has caused policymakers to reconsider the definition of "soft" drugs. Some have advocated to bring Dutch policy in line with international standards by completely banning all drugs, soft or hard. But others say the current policy of tolerance is inconsistent, and that soft drugs should be legalized on the books as well as in practice.

The Netherlands effectively decriminalized soft drugs a few decades ago when it introduced a policy of "non-enforcement." Although possession and cultivation of cannabis remains technically illegal in Holland, law enforcement has systematically turned a blind eye, and the courts usually rule in favor of individual defendants.

Two years ago, Gerd Leers, mayor of the border city of Maastricht, criticized this government policy. Leers said that by allowing possession and retail sales of cannabis but not cultivation or wholesale, the government creates problems of crime and public safety.

The De Molen coffee shop has survived the wave of closures -- and so has another legal curiosity of the Dutch penal code. Shops are barred from transporting drugs to their stores. "How the stuff gets there remains a mystery," a customs official says.

 

lilgrasshoppah

1) i've noted this numerous times.... but it never fails to interest me. If marijuana is such a serious concern, why do people joke about it all the fucking time? Seriously. Do you see the media making lame puns about terrorists car-bombing bazaars? Did wink, wink, nudge, nudge, quips flood the airwaves after the terrible events at Virginia Tech? Of course not. Those events are serious business, and you woud never DREAM of dishonoring the memory of those most directly affected, by whipping out the crass, low-brow, pandering, bullshit. But this is not so with cannabis. And it's not the occasional intrepid reporter or pundit. It's ALL the time, ALL across the political spectrum. Things "go to pot"... unless they go "up in smoke"... and authorities have to "weed out" this, that, or the other. It's like they know, deep in their hearts that weed prohibition is a joke. And not a particularly funny one, either.

2) How come we never hear about positive weed stories coming out of Amsterdam? If the so-called "liberal media" is to be believed, all the coffee shops are four seconds away from being closed forever. How many years have the coffee shops been successfully in business? And now the government is going to close them down, because... they bring tourists into town? Uh....? I'm speechless. (or, unable to type... but only by way of metaphor.) Because that's usually the way the government works: "hmmm, we seem to be making a lot of money at this. Put a stop to it immediately!"

3) Notice, by the way, that anybody who visits Amsterdam is a drug tourist.... not a red-light district tourist or a tulip tourist or a windmill tourist or a free bicycle tourist, or even a dike tourist (not even the lesbians). Always "drug" tourists. Remember, though: the experiment is failing... even as, by every rational measurement, it succeeds. Talk about doublespeak.

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godfather

Yeah, I was wondering that same thing. It doesn't make any sense; it would be like Nevada making gambling illegal. Go to Nevada, and go tell the governor you want all gambling banned. I'm pretty sure the answer you would get is somewhere along the lines of "are you fricken serious?!"

If it is true that the laws in the Netherlands are changing for the worse, I think that is a real shame. For a long time I have wanted to visit there, or perhaps even live there. But by the time I am actually able to make that happen, weed may be just as illegal as it is here. I really hope that doesn't happen.

kcbennie

I think that the "problem" with the "drug tourists" is not necessarily the world travelers who go to Amsterdam for a week and get stoned while they are there. I think the problem that they are referring to are the people in the boredering countries, who live very close to the boreders, going into Amsterdam with the sole purpose of scoring a bag and then going home.

If you made wonderful cookies for guests who visit your house, you wouldn't want someone showing up at your door every day, taking 5 cookies and then immediately leaving.

I think a better solution to Amsterdam's problem would be to put major pressure on neighboring countries, the UN for that matter, to legalize (or at least tolerate the way they have). Amsterdam should make a presentation to the UN, giving a business model on how to tolerate and regulate cannibis. I think that all would agree that Amsterdam has been proven to be succesful in their strategy.

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"My friend said 'Man, the weather is really trippy' and I said 'The weather's not trippy. It's just the way that you perceive the weather that is in fact trippy.' And then I though to myself 'I should've just said 'Yeah.''"

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Buzzby

If I was giving cookies away, I would resent it. If I was selling cookies, they'd be welcome at any time. AFAIK, nobody in The Netherlands is giving away weed.

You might be right, though, about "day trippers" who don't spend any money on restaurants and hotels. Cities generally encourage tourism because it's good for the economy.

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kcbennie

That is a good point.