CANNABIS NETS SWISS TRADERS UKP200 MILLION

CONCERN is growing in Switzerland that a legal loophole allows cannabis to
be cultivated openly on farms and sold over the counter or via the internet
as "hemp". Unlike most European countries, Switzerland allows cannabis to be
grown legally while prohibiting its use as a drug. Cannabis, used for rope
making and as a herbal tonic since ancient times, has enjoyed a revival
among growers in recent years and is cultivated to produce textiles and
cosmetics, to flavour food products and even to brew hemp beer. Dozens of
hemp farms have sprung up in Switzerland in the past five years along with
150 hemp shops, where hemp products are sold together with marijuana. To
cover themselves legally, the shops pack the dried weed in cellophane, and
then barcode, price and label it as "hemp tea", "dried flowers", "organic
buds" and "scent sachets".

Some traders warn consumers: "Persons attempting to use the contents for
purposes other than those for which they were intended are subject to the
consequences of their own actions." Some web sites offering these products
for sale declare "Not for export". But in reality they are glad to take
orders and ship the goods abroad.

Francois Reusser, the president of the Swiss Hemp Association, who runs
Chanf, a popular Zurich hemp shop, said: "Customers who ask for marijuana
are sent packing." Swiss police estimate that only five to 15 per cent of
Swiss hemp production is used legally - the rest is smoked. Switzerland has
become Europe's biggest hemp producer, with 200 tons expected this year. Mr
Reusser said this year's turnover will be UKP200 million. Mr Reusser, who
likens smoking marijuana to drinking wine or puffing a cigar, added: "Why
must a mature adult have contact with the criminal milieu when they want to
buy cannabis?"

One hemp trader was convicted by a Swiss court two years ago for selling
drugs. But another court acquitted a fellow trader in a similar case while
calling for clarity in the law. A recent report by the Federal Commission
for Narcotics Issues, an independent panel that advises the government,
found that half a million people out of Switzerland's population of seven
million smoked cannabis at least once a month.

It concluded that cannabis had all but attained middle-class respectability
"because of widespread use and a marked increase in its social status". The
panel recommended legalising possession, sale and consumption of small
amounts within a strict legal framework. Recent surveys of Switzerland's
four ruling coalition parties found three were in favour of legalising
cannabis under strict conditions.

Only the Right-wing nationalist Swiss People's Party was opposed to the
legalising of cannabis. The cannabis debate may yet surprise Switzerland's
neighbours, who regard the law-and-order conscious Alpine state as a bastion
of conservatism.