DUTCH PLANNING TO REGULATE MARIJUANA CROP

Coalition of Parties Wants Commodity Treated Like Tobacco -- Virtual
Legalization

AMSTERDAM - A broad coalition of political parties announced a plan
yesterday to regulate marijuana farming on the model of tobacco, in
what may be the most significant development in Dutch drug policy in years.

Opponents in the government said the move would be tantamount to
legalization. But the proponents, representing a large majority in
parliament, have threatened a showdown if the government tries to
block the proposal.

Prime Minister Jan-Peter Balkenende and his Christian Democrat party
oppose allowing cannabis cultivation because it would set the
Netherlands another step apart from the rest of Europe.

"When making drug policy, you can't just base it on national
considerations alone, you have to also think international
relations," Mr. Balkenende said in a reaction to the plan at his
weekly news briefing.

"This experiment would be at odds with Dutch law and there's a legal
problem" internationally as well, he said.

But legislator Frans Weekers, whose conservative VVD party recently
swung its support to the proposed program, said the current policy is
"hypocritical and leading to increasing problems."

"There comes a moment when you say: 'Now we have to take the next
step,'" Mr. Weekers said in a telephone interview.

"If this pilot program works and we can show to everyone that it's an
improvement, then you have a good argument to take to foreign governments."

He added there was no support at all for criminalizing marijuana
among either politicians or Dutch society.

After 30 years of tolerating marijuana, usage rates in the
Netherlands are in the middle of international norms. Data from
various governments compiled by Trimbos, the Netherlands' Institute
for Health and Addiction, shows usage is higher in the Netherlands
than in Scandinavia but lower than in the United States and Britain.

Under current Dutch policy, marijuana and hashish are illegal but
police don't fine smokers for possession of less than five grams or
prosecute for possession of less than 30 grams. Authorities look the
other way regarding the open sale of cannabis in designated "coffee houses."

But growers are subject to raids and prosecution, giving rise to a
contradictory system where shop owners have no legal way to purchase
their best-selling product.

Growers often operate from underground greenhouses in homes and
garages. Critics said this leads to the theft of electricity in
unsafe circumstances, causing fires and bringing criminality into
residential neighbourhoods.

Under the test program, to be conducted near the southern city
Maastricht, existing health and safety standards will apply to growers.

Coffee houses would be required to provide consumers with information
about the health hazards of smoking and about the chemical content of
the marijuana they buy.

Dutch mayors along the country's borders have lobbied hardest for the
change, facing problems from drug tourists from Germany and Belgium
who drive to the Netherlands to buy supplies.

Supporters said regulation of production would, like regulating
tobacco, make smuggling large quantities across the border more difficult.

"It will be possible to trace where cannabis is grown and where it's
sold," Mr. Weekers said.

It also could open the door to outright legalization and taxation of
an industry with annual domestic sales estimated at the equivalent of
more than $800 million Canadian.