'MINDBOGGLING' MARIJUANA CROP TOPS 800 TONNES

Canadians Harvest More Marijuana Than Parsley, Rcmp Report Says

More marijuana was grown in Canada last year than parsley, with the
criminal crop increasingly taking root in Ontario and Quebec.

A new RCMP report on Canada's $18-billion illicit street-drug trade
estimates at least 800 tonnes of marijuana was grown domestically last
year.

It's the first time the Mounties have made such a calculation and the
results have surprised even them. (By comparison, 737 tonnes of
parsley sprouted in Canada last year.)

"This estimate appears overwhelming," says the report, and, in fact,
drug investigators believe it's "quite conservative." Adds Leo
Vaillant, one of the report's authors: "It's sort of mindboggling, but
that appears to be what the situation is."

The release of the report this week follows a call last month by the
association representing Canada's police chiefs, and quickly backed by
the RCMP, for the federal government to decriminalize the possession
of small amounts of marijuana.

The chiefs' new policy recommends giving police officers the option of
ticketing people caught with 30 grams or less of marijuana, sparing
them a criminal record. They argue the move, which stops short of
legalizing the drug, could free up police resources to tackle more
serious crimes.

Yesterday, Mr. Vaillant stressed the marijuana (and other narcotics)
estimates in the report are not a police attempt to exaggerate the
problem. In fact, he said, police went out of their way to be
conservative.

"We didn't want to put a number out there (that would cause people) to
say, 'here go the police again, they're going to try to spook us.'
(With) all the figures, we're always using the lowest estimates."

The marijuana estimate is based, in part, on the more than one million
marijuana plants police seized across the country last year, up from
about 690,000 in 1997. (A more efficient RCMP system of tracking
cross-country seizures in 1998 accounts for part of that increase.)

Still, police estimate 4.7 million plants were harvested, with each
mature plant producing an average 170 grams of "marketable substance."
And production is up, say police, because demand appears to be growing.

After coffee, alcohol and tobacco and certain prescription drugs,
cannabis is the most popular psychoactive substance in the nation,
says the Canadian Centre on Substance Abuse.

But after a decade of relatively stable usage rates, it says marijuana
smoking is gaining in popularity again, especially among the young.

Then there's the money to be made.

In British Columbia, Canada's chief cannibis-growing region, a
kilogram of potent, hydroponic marijuana - with a tetrahydrocannabinol
(THC) strength of 15 to 20 per cent - is reported to be selling for
more than $6,000 to middlemen.

High-grade hydroponic marijuana represents only about 10 per cent the
total amount grown in Canada, but hydroponic operations with more than
3,000 plants are not uncommon, says the report. The rest is
organically grown, with THC values under 10 per cent, says Mr. Vaillant.

So much potent B.C. weed is now suspected of being smuggled into the
U.S. that the U.S. State Department this month cited it as one of the
obstacles to a more open border with Canada.

The profitability of the B.C. growing and smuggling operations has
also caught the attention of eastern producers, notably in Ontario and
Quebec.

"Why should it be limited to (British Columbia)? People are realizing
there's profits to be made by this type of cultivation and they're
getting into it," says Mr. Vaillant, of the force's drug analysis unit.

In the latest of dozens of busts by Ontario and Quebec police over the
last couple of years, Quebec police this month swooped down on five
residences and farm buildings in the Labelle area, about 60 kilometres
north of Sainte-Agathe, and seized 7,250 marijuana plants with an
estimated street value of $7 million.

And although it is still a developing market, the report says it's
likely that marijuana is being smuggled into the United States across
all land border points, including by organized crime groups in Quebec.

Mr. Vaillant believes another reason for the boom are the sentences
for people convicted of cultivating marijuana. "We have a bit lighter
sentencing. It's quite severe in the United States, (where) the judge
has no latitude to determine the sentence."

Other highlights of the RCMP's 1998 drug report include:

- -At least 100 tonnes of hashish, 15 tonnes of cocaine and six tonnes
of liquid hashish are smuggled into Canada annually.

- -One to two tonnes of heroin are required each year to meet the demand
of Canadian heroin users.

- -Drug trafficking remains the principal source of revenue for most
organized crime groups. In Canada, the drug trade has the potential to
generate criminal proceeds in excess of $4 billion at the wholesale
level and of $18 billion at the street level.

- -Italian-based organized crime is involved in upper-echelon
importation and distribution of many types of narcotics.

- -Asian-based groups are active in heroin and, increasingly, cocaine
trafficking at all levels.

- -Colombian-based traffickers still control much of the cocaine trade
in eastern and central Canadian cities.

- -Outlaw motorcycle gangs play a major role in the importation and
large-scale distribution of marijuana, cocaine and chemical drugs.

The RCMP report is available on the force's website at
www.rcmp-grc.gc.ca/html/drugsituation.htm