CANADA RANKS, LIKE, REALLY HIGH ON LIST OF WORLD'S MARIJUANA USERS

We Smoke More Than Jamaicans: UN Report

Marijuana use in Canada is the highest in the industrialized world,
far higher than in the Netherlands where it's legal, and more than
four times the global rate, a report by the United Nations has found.

The report also says cannabis use around the world appears to have
stabilized and seems to be declining in North America.

A plunge in use by Ontario high school students was cited as a factor
in the trend.

The world drug-use study by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime said 16.8
per cent of Canadians aged 15 to 64 smoked marijuana or used other
cannabis products in 2004, the most recent year for which statistics
were cited.

Marijuana possession remains illegal in Canada, despite years of
recommendations by parliamentarians to decriminalize it. As a result,
tens of thousands of people have criminal records for possession.

The study, using the most recent statistics collected from each
country -- although some dated back almost a decade -- estimated that
3.8 per cent of the world's population aged 15 to 64 used cannabis in
2005. That was about 159 million people, down slightly from 162
million the previous year.

The data show Canadian usage is fifth after Zambia (17.7 per cent in
2003), Ghana (21.5 per cent in 1998) and Papua New Guinea and
Micronesia, which tied for first place at 29 per cent in 1995.

The Canadian statistics compared to 2005 rates of 8.7 per cent in
Britain, 12.6 per cent in the United States, 8.5 per cent in Israel;
10.7 per cent in Jamaica (2001), and 6.1 per cent in the Netherlands
(2001), where it is legal to buy and sell marijuana for personal use.

In some countries in East and Southeast Asia, such as Korea and
Singapore, and in the Middle East, such as Oman and Qatar, cannabis
use is negligible.

The report said cannabis comprises, by far, the largest illicit drug
market on the planet.

The study also noted a 38-per-cent decline in cannabis use among Grade
12 students in the U.S. between 1979, when marijuana use peaked, and
2006. A 19-per-cent decrease in use by Ontario high school students
between 2003 and 2005 was also noted.

The report also said there was slightly less trafficking of cannabis
from Canada into the United States in 2005.

"This could indicate that cannabis production stabilized or even
declined slightly in Canada, following large production increases in
previous years," the report said, citing Canadian government
estimates. "Between 2000 and 2004, production in Canada more than doubled."

However, the report also suggested that the altered trafficking trend
could also indicate that organized crime groups have relocated to the
American Pacific northwest and California to avoid tightened border
controls.

Forty per cent of Canadian cannabis is produced in British Columbia,
25 per cent in Ontario and 25 per cent in Quebec, the report said.