Cultivation of crops deemed illicit

Events

Beyond prohibition: Unpacking the connection between drug policies and sustainable development priorities

New York / Online

19 September 2023

This side event at the 2023 SDG summit underscores that without a major reframing of the 'world drug problem' and a focus on sustainable development priorities, there is a risk of falling short of achieving the 2030 Agenda.

News30 August 2023

Cannabis is illegal in Nigeria but provides a living for families - Study calls for rethink of drug laws

Cannabis growers rely on the crop as a source of vital income and would welcome the possibility of transitioning into a formal market, without stigma and criminalisation.

Publications30 August 2023

Crisis and opportunity: Unravelling Colombia’s collapsing coca markets

WOLA discusses the coca market crisis in Colombia, exploring its many potential causes and urging authorities to seize the opportunity to provide aid, improved civilian governance and avenues for economic development.

News26 August 2023

India: Punjab politicians renew demand for legalising opium sale, say 'it's part of our culture'

Calls for legal opium trade grow, citing the benefits of a regulated supply for youth and communities.

News22 August 2023

Drug policy and pathways to peace in Colombia

As momentum for drug policy reform grows in Colombia, the growers of northern Cauca insist on a clear demand: that profits from legal regulation do not go to armed groups or big business, but to the growers themselves.

News21 August 2023

If you care about the climate crisis, fight to legalise drugs

Huge profits from the drug trade are financing illegal industries responsible for destroying much of the Amazon, highlighting the often overlooked and complex relationship between drug prohibition and environmental degradation.

News16 August 2023

The coca business’s collapse has crushed rural Colombia

Falling prices have plunged thousands of coca-growing families into hardship, underscoring the need for sustainable solutions to rural communities' precarious dependence on this unstable illicit market.

News11 July 2023

Truly unprecedented: The Taliban drugs ban in Afghanistan v2.0.

While the longer-term impacts of the ban on the global heroin supply will greatly depend on potential subsequent bans on cultivation and trade, the livelihoods of thousands of landless labourers are in danger.

News5 July 2023

Colombia’s forests, silent victims of the war on drugs

The environmental impacts of informal cocaine production and the policies implemented to stamp it out highlight the climate cost of prohibition.

News30 June 2023

Taliban opium ban: What the future holds

While it is not yet clear whether the Taliban's opium ban will remain, policymakers must consider the huge risk of increased overdose deaths in Europe if the heroin supply does dry up, and urgently begin contingency planning and delivery of interventions.

News26 June 2023

Uganda's cannabis news unveiled a deeper systemic injustice

Efforts to repeal drug policy legislation reveal how hundreds of khat users and growers have been wrongly imprisoned across Uganda.

News9 June 2023

Supreme Court affirms decision to strike out law on marijuana cultivation in Ghana

While the procedure to adopt cultivation clauses was deemed unconstitutional, an amendment is being negotiated.

Explore more content