DEALERS STRUGGLE AFTER CANNABIS CRACKDOWN

A POLICE crackdown on cannabis farms has left dealers struggling to
keep up with demand.

Some dealers are even offering cash to regular customers who agree to
grow drugs in their spare room.

Drug education charity DrugScope said the campaign by the Association
of Chief Police Officers (ACPO) - which lasted less than a fortnight -
led to the street price of dope doubling in some areas.

The group said dealers were finding it difficult to keep up with
demand after hundreds of farms were raided by police across England
and Wales.

Its Druglink magazine reported: "The raids have forced some dealers to
offer regular customers cash for the use of a spare room for a three
month growing cycle."

In recent years, home-grown cannabis had come to make up 60% of the
country's supply, outstripping imports of the drug.

Therefore, the ACPO campaign has had a devastating impact on the
illegal trade, the magazine went on.

Fifteen police forces took part in "Operation Keymer" from September
25 to October 5, seizing 28,000 cannabis plants and 54 kilos of
prepared cannabis with a potential value of more than UKP2.5 million.

ACPO cannabis spokesman Allan Gibson, a commander at the Metropolitan
Police, said: "The objective of Operation Keymer was to reduce the
harm caused by criminal networks in producing high-potency cannabis.

"We have focused on closing down high-profit cannabis factories,
arresting the organised criminals behind them and freezing the
criminal assets that would otherwise have been ploughed back into crime."