CANADIAN CANNABIS CULTURE

Cannabis cultivation--what Ian Mulgrew qualifies as "a victimless
pursuit"--in Canada has been increasing. Albeit illegal, marijuana has
become the country's most valuable agricultural product, surpassing
wheat, timber and cattle.

Mulgrew is the author of Bud Inc. the latest book to join the
discourse on Canada's cannabis industry. He believes in the
legalization--not decriminalization--of marijuana, and thinks that
this will ultimately come about from the drug's medicinal properties.

The active ingredient in marijuana, taxonomically designated Cannabis
sativa or Cannabis indicia, is the psychoactive chemical
tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) and is found in the leaves, flowers and
buds of the plant. It was only in 1964 that THC was identified as the
active narcotic agent

The two strains of Cannabis, sativa and indicia produce a high and
stone respectively. A `high' correlates to a more active, cerebral
experience--for example, a lot of rapid thoughts--while a `stone' is
defined by its more subdued, reflective affect.

There is a cannabis grading system that determines the quality and
monetary worth of a product. A AAA-grading is reserved for product
which is formed of tight clusters, a lot of resin and has a floral,
eucalyptus smell. A level below is A-quality, typically grown outdoors
and has relatively looser buds. BBB bud has a chemical taste, and
leaves a black ash after being burnt.

The process for growing top quality weed, adapted from Inside Dope,
Forbes, 2003:

A grower needs lights; using 1,000-watt metal halide lights to blast
clones for 24 hours a day, following with 12-hour intervals of dark to
induce budding, a half-year growth cycle is reduced to ten weeks.

Genetics are important, as breeding stock is critical for high end
product. Branches of the best female plants are cut and planted, with
the genetically identical offspring subsequently cloned.

The air temperature is kept in the 70s; adding carbon dioxide
increases production and betters quality.

The quality of dirt--or hydroponics or aeroponics--is improved with
nitrogen for growth, beneficial fungi and bacteria to increase THC
levels and phosphorous and potassium for the resinous flowers.

Canada's cannabis industry, although producing less than the state of
California, is lucrative.

Mulgrew cites figures calculated by Dr. Stephen T. Easton, an
economist at the Simon Fraser Institute. Based on numbers for 2003,
Easton has estimated that across the country the marijuana industry
was worth $5.7 billion wholesale and $19.5 billion when applied to
high-end retail pricing

Macleans recently polled Canadians' for their opinion whether Canada
should relax its laws concerning the possession and use of marijuana.
The results--listed November 5, 2005 on Macleans' online site--showed
62 percent in support of legalization, 20 percent in favor of
decriminalization and 18 percent who think that marijuana should
remain an illegal substance.

Cannabis is considered illegal under the 1996 Controlled Drugs and
Substances Act. Sections four to seven of the Act render the
respective possession, trafficking, import and export and cultivation
of cannabis criminal activities.

The Special Committee on Non-Medical Use of Drugs of Canada's House of
Commons defines "decriminalization" as the removal of criminal
sanctions for specified criminal acts while retaining legal
prohibition, for example, fines.

"By designating as contraventions, those offences relating to the
possession or cultivation of small amounts of cannabis for personal
use, the proposed decriminalization scheme would leave existing
criminal sanctions in place to allow the full force of the law to
continue to be brought to bear against anyone who traffic in or
cultivates cannabis for profit," the committee's 2002 report states.

Ian Mulgrew disagrees. Decriminalization is a "half measure" that will
only concretize the black market and strengthen criminal
organizations.

The underlying problem of prohibition, Mulgrew contends, is that it
keeps intact a law that is not respected-- this ensues "corrosive
damage to the social fabric."

The fact that there is flagrant disobedience erodes and illegitimates
the entire legal structure. Mulgrew suggests perpetual effects, for
example diminishing respect for law enforcement and the legal courts.

The International Center for Criminal Law Reform and Criminal Justice
Policy in British Columbia released a report on the Strategic
Approaches to the Control and Prosecution of Marihuana Growing and
Trafficking Offences. The report recognizes the "relative inability of
the current criminal justice system to limit the ability of criminal
organizations to conduct and benefit [from cannabis activities as] =85
arguably the most powerful argument in favor" of reforming the current
methods of control.

A veteran Canadian journalist, Mulgrew began his career in Ontario. He
was named West Coast Bureau Chief for the Globe and Mail in 1981 and
posted to Vancouver. He has lived in Vancouver since and he currently
writes a legal affairs column for the Vancouver Sun.

When Mulgrew's mother was diagnosed with Cancer at the age of 70, he
began to get more involved in the cannabis industry--particularly in
marijuana as a prescription drug.

Mulgrew says he learned how difficult the government marijuana plan
was to "get into." This was an initial step for his decision to write
a book on public policy and the laws prohibiting marijuana.

In 1989 specific brain receptors for THC were identified. The
receptors are activated by a neurotransmitter called anandaminde, a
member of a group of chemicals known as cannabinoids. THC is a
cannabinoid chemical and its anandaminde-like behavior enables it to
connect to cannabinoid receptors.

There are clear medicinal implications.

Dr. Lester Grinspoon is a professor at Harvard University Medical
School in the Department of Psychiatry. Grinspoon has been studying
cannabis since 1967.

Dr. Grinspoon is an advocate for the beneficial, medicinal qualities
of the marijuana plant. For example, Cancer patients can find relief
in marijuana as an appetite stimulate and as a mood elevator--also
useful for patients who suffer from AIDS. Most commonly, marijuana is
commissioned for its capacity to prevent nausea and vomiting from
cancer chemotherapy.

In October of 1997, Grinspoon testified before the Crime Subcommittee
of the Judiciary Committee of the United States House of
Representative to the potential medical applications of marijuana,
from treating glaucoma and seizures, to reducing pain--particularly in
cases that accompany muscle spasm, as with "victims of traumatic nerve
injury, and people suffering from multiple sclerosis or cerebral
palsy. Many of them have discovered that cannabis not only allows them
to avoid the risk of other drugs, but also reduces muscle spasms and
tremors."

"The years of effort devoted to showing that marihuana is exceedingly
dangerous have proved the opposite. It is safer, with few serious side
effects, than most prescription medicines, and far less addictive or
subject to abuse than many drugs now used in muscle relaxants,
hypnotics and analgesics," Grinspoon said before the House committee.

The case for marijuana as a prescription drug made its way into the
Canadian courts. On January 9, 2003 in the case R. v. Hitzig Justice
Lederman of the Ontario Superior Court of Justice declared the
Marihuana Medical Access Regulations (MNAR) to be unconstitutional, as
the MNAR prohibits seriously ill Canadians access to and the use of
Marijuana because there is no legal source of supply.

Even with the legalization of marijuana as a prescription drug, there
still remains the question of whether to adopt the legal status of
marijuana for ordinary purposes--toking and cultivating--and if so,
how.

In his paper, Marijuana Growth in British Columbia, Easton offers a
solution under the chapter heading Legalization in Canada: Suppose We Tax
it Like Other Sins?: a tax, in effect like the tax on tobacco cigarettes.
By Easton's calculations, at present a marijuana cigarettes costs around
$1.50 to produce, and sells for about $8.60. Easton proposes a tax "on
marijuana cigarettes equal to the difference between the local production
cost and the street price." At revenue of approximately $7 per cigarette
this brings the total revenue to over $2 billion.

"Importantly, this approach has the effect of transferring to the
government revenue currently received by illegal producers as reward
for their cost of production and risk," Easton states.

Mulgrew says that marijuana is considered "bad" because it is illegal,
and not because of any intrinsically condemning qualities. The idea is
that there was a verdict before the trial. On his personal website,
Dr. Grinspoon posts a quote by an Acoma Pueblo poet named Simon Ortiz;
it reads, "there are no truths, only stories".