Analyst:

WITH U.S. MIRED IN DRUG WAR, POT BECOMES TOP CASH CROP

SEATTLE -- Marijuana has become the biggest cash crop in the United
States, bringing in more annually than corn and wheat combined,
according to an analysis released last week by a public-policy
researcher. Jon Gettman, a Virginia-based researcher, wrote the report
using government data.

It's among the top three cash crops in 30 states, Gettman said. He
said the nation's five largest producers are California, Tennessee,
Kentucky, Hawaii and Washington.

California's marijuana crop is worth an estimated $13.8 billion.
Nationally, domestic marijuana production has increased 10 times over
in the past 25 years, from 1,000 metric tons in 1981 to 10,000 metric
tons in 2006, according to federal government estimates cited in the
report. Gettman's study argues that the U.S. is forfeiting millions in
potential tax revenue every year by criminalizing marijuana.

Drug-enforcement officials say they aren't surprised by the estimates,
but a regional enforcement agent worries that putting a dollar figure
on the crop perpetuates a "fallacy" that marijuana represents a
harmless tax windfall.

"You can look at anything being a cash crop if you don't want to make
any conclusions about the damage it does," said Dave Rodriguez, the
director of the Northwest High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area
program, a Seattle-based division of the Office of National Drug
Control Policy. Gettman's report started with a widely used federal
pot-production estimate that about 10,000 metric tons of marijuana are
produced domestically every year. He divided that amount among the 50
states based on how much marijuana was seized in each state.

[sidebar]

TOTAL MARIJUANA CULTIVATION

Pounds Total State produced value

California 8.6 million $13.8 billion

Tennessee 3 million $4.8 billion

Kentucky 2.8 million $4.5 billion Hawaii 2.4 million $3.8 billion

Washington 641,354 $1 billion

Source - "Marijuana Production in the United States (2006)" by Jon
Gettman, published in The Bulletin of Cannabis Reform, December 2006