Belgium is one of the largest producers of MDMA (ecstasy) in the world. The illegal production and sale of ecstasy is a source of income for organised crime and has a negative impact on public health, the environment and society.

In 2023, Belgium took a significant step in the discussion on drug policy by organising the XTC Expo. This exhibition allowed visitors to discover what a legal, regulated ecstasy market might look like. Through three fictional spaces—smartshop, pharmacy and nightclub—the expo invited people to imagine and experience alternative futures.

The XTC Expo was the first of its kind. With over 1,200 visitors and 900 survey responses, it revealed strong public support for a legally regulated market with strict controls. This final report presents the concept, the fictional spaces, the responses of visitors and the lessons learned.

XTC Expo – Final report

Thailand set to U-turn on recreational cannabis use

Thailand decriminalized cannabis in 2022. However, it did so without a comprehensive law regulating its sale, production or use.

Since then, tens of thousands of licensed dispensaries and retailers selling cannabis and cannabis extracts have opened across the country, particularly in tourist hot spots.

Three years later, Thailand is now planning to tighten the control of marijuana use, ensuring that cannabis is only used for medicinal purposes and not recreationally.

Under a new medical bill expected to be announced in the next few weeks, dispensaries will be allowed to sell cannabis only to other licensed shops or to customers with a prescription from a medical professional.

Chokwan "Kitty" Chopaka, a well-known cannabis activist in Thailand, said the new medical bill could see a 90% drop in licensed cannabis shops in Thailand.

The Netherlands expanded a government-run initiative on Monday allowing legal cannabis sales.

While growing cannabis is still illegal, cannabis shops — known as coffeeshops — in 10 municipalities will be allowed to sell marijuana from 10 licensed producers.

“Weed was sold here legally for 50 years, but the production was never legal. So it’s finally time to end that crazy, unexplainable situation and make it a legal professional sector,” Rick Bakker, commercial director at Hollandse Hoogtes, one of the regulated producers, told The Associated Press.

Some 80 coffeeshops are taking part in the experiment which advocates hope this will ultimately end a long-standing legal anomaly — you can buy and sell small amounts of weed without fear of prosecution in the Netherlands, but growing it commercially remains illegal.

Bakker's company in Bemmel, near the German border, is indistinguishable from the surrounding greenhouses producing tomatoes and peppers. But it makes 200 kilograms (440 pounds) of weed per week and is one of the largest producers in the experiment.

A trailblazer in decriminalizing pot since the 1970s, the Netherlands has grown more conservative. 

, long a magnet for marijuana smokers, has been closing coffeeshops in recent years and has banned smoking weed on some of the cobbled streets that make up its historic center.

Advocates have been pushing for a legal growing for years, citing the safety of the product as well as concerns about crime.

Dutch cannabis growers welcome expansion of state-run experiment to make sales legal

This report evaluates the economic impacts of legalising and regulating cannabis for adult non-medical use in the UK from a Treasury perspective of income and spending. The report focuses on government revenues (corporation and income tax, VAT, National Insurance, licensing fees, and, in the scenario of a state monopoly model, profits), savings across the criminal justice system (CJS) from reduced costs on enforcement, and the costs of administering a regulatory model.

For Transform, economic arguments for cannabis, though significant, are secondary to public health and social justice policy priorities. But the economic dimensions of the cannabis reform debate are undoubtedly gaining
political salience, particularly as governments face growing budgetary pressures. Public support for cannabis reform, particularly for economic reasons, such as disrupting illegal profits and the potential tax income, is growing in both the U.S. and the UK.

This report analyses three different regulatory scenarios:

1. Home-grow provision for personal use, and non-profit membership-based associations, with no commercial retail

2. Hybrid model including home grow, non-profit associations and regulated commercial retail

3. A Hybrid model Home grow, non-profit associations, and commercial retail operating under a state monopoly (profits on retail sale accrue to the state)


High returns: The economic benefits of UK cannabis legalisation

This article examines narratives of cannabis legalization in Nigeria. While most existing research on cannabis legalization has concentrated on the global North, we focus on one of Africa's largest cannabis markets, as well as the views of actors heavily criminalized and excluded from policy debates. Based on in-depth interviews and long-time engagement with illicit cannabis farmers and traders, the article highlights the contestations in their hidden narratives, troubling extant views of cannabis legalization which uncritically laud its socioeconomic benefits, and revealing the potential downsides of legalization in the context of an exploitative legal neo-liberal economy rife with social inequities. The findings of this study also highlight a need for open policy debate that engages criminalized cannabis producing communities who have borne the brunt of both prohibition and economic marginalization to chart the way forward for more inclusive and meaningful cannabis policy reform.

Contesting cannabis legalization in Nigeria: Hidden narratives of illicit farmers and traders

The Global Commission on Drug Policy’s report, 

Beyond Punishment: From Criminal Justice Responses to Drug Policy Reform

, exposes how punitive drug policies have driven mass incarceration and grave human rights violations. In 2023 alone, over 3.1 million people were arrested for drug-related offenses, with 20% of the global prison population detained for such crimes - nearly half for simple possession.

The report underscores the devastating consequences of prohibitionist policies, including over one million overdose deaths in the U.S. in the past two decades and 40,000 in Canada in just eight years. It also highlights systemic inequities, such as Indigenous peoples in Canada being six times more likely to face drug-related arrests than white counterparts. Furthermore, the report illustrates the disproportionate burdens on women and children, deepening cycles of poverty and marginalization.

It examines the broad spectrum of criminal justice responses to drug offenses, ranging from stop-and-search practices that disproportionately target marginalized communities to extreme measures like the death penalty and enforced treatment. These approaches often violate human rights, perpetuate stigma, and fail to address the root causes of substance use.

Offering a roadmap for reform, the report advocates for evidence-based strategies, including harm reduction measures (e.g., Overdose Prevention Centers, naloxone distribution, and safer supply programs), decriminalization and the legal regulation of drug markets. These approaches not only save lives but also reduce societal harms, foster dignity, and promote health and equity.

Beyond punishment: from criminal justice responses to drug policy reform

The full text of UN HC Volker Türk's statement is available here.

 conference in Warsaw on Thursday, High Commissioner Volker Türk highlighted the urgent need for a human rights-based approach to drug regulation, pointing to record numbers of drug-related deaths and increasing drug use disorders.

The conference, which builds on January’s ‘Dealing with Drugs I’ meeting hosted by the Mayor of Amsterdam, brought together leaders and experts from across Europe and the world to share best practices and expertise.

“Criminalisation and prohibition have failed to reduce drug use and failed to deter drug-related crime. 

These policies are simply not working – and we are failing some of the most vulnerable groups in our societies

The High Commissioner’s address comes amid a surge in illicit drug production and distribution.

In Afghanistan, despite a 2022 Taliban ban that initially reduced 

 2024 saw a 19 per cent resurgence driven by economic hardship and rising prices. Meanwhile, North America faces an unprecedented 

, with synthetic drugs claiming lives at an alarming rate across the United States and parts of Asia and Africa.

He emphasised the need for a radical shift in approach that prioritises health, dignity and inclusion.

Instead of punitive measures, we need gender-sensitive and evidence-based drug policies, grounded by public health

,” Mr. Türk urged. He also called for “inclusive access to voluntary medical care and other social services,” emphasising that harm reduction measures are essential in preventing drug overdose fatalities.

A key element of reform, Mr. Türk declared, is decriminalisation. “

We need to start treating the person, not punishing the drug use disorder

,” advocating for social reintegration support to accompany policy changes.

The High Commissioner pointed to clear evidence supporting this approach: “

Focusing on inclusion and education over incarceration means that drug consumption falls

. Choosing social reintegration over stigmatisation means that drug-related infections decrease”.

At the centre of policy development, Mr. Türk stressed the importance of a focus on people most affected by current drug policies.

“Historically, people who use drugs are marginalised, criminalised, discriminated against and left behind – very often stripped of their dignity and their rights,” he noted.

We are destined to fail unless we ensure their genuine participation in formulating and implementing drug policy

“The evidence is clear. The so-called War on Drugs has failed, completely and utterly,” Mr. Türk concluded. “And prioritising people over punishment means more lives are saved”.

‘War on drugs has failed, completely and utterly’: UN human rights chief

What would the consequences of the potential cocaine and cannabis regulation in Rio de Janeiro be? This report dives into analyzing these potential impacts in a city long plagued by violence linked to drug trafficking and social inequality. With the recent decriminalization of cannabis possession in June 2024, this study explores whether broader drug regulation can reduce violence, dismantle organized crime, and alleviate mass incarceration in the favelas.

After the war on drugs: The impacts of cocaine and cannabis regulation in Rio de Janeiro

The Expert Seminar on Cannabis Regulation aimed to address the evolving landscape of cannabis regulation within the European Union and its intersection with international drug control treaties. Organized by the Transnational Institute (TNI) and co-sponsored by the Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) and the Global Drugs Policy Observatory (GDPO), the seminar gathered policy and legal experts from six European countries engaged in various forms of cannabis regulation, five of which are EU member states (Czechia, Germany, Luxembourg, Malta and the Netherlands) and one non-EU country (Switzerland). Also present were experts from the United States of America, where cannabis regulation is in full swing in states and discussed at the federal level, as well as other international policy experts and scholars in international law. Over the course of two days, the participants discussed the current state of cannabis regulation, legal tensions, and future scenarios for policy development.

Cannabis regulation, EU drug law, trade rules and the UN drug control treaties

On a dancefloor in Amsterdam in 1984, Dutch DJ 

 was told: “You have to try this.” He took a dab of 

 and, with his curiosity piqued, he soon swallowed an entire 

. Naturally, he had an incredible journey. (

 remembers the first time they felt that euphoric rush.) “Everything was like an entirely new experience. We would touch each other; sensations and warmth,” he is quoted as saying in 

The ecstasy scene then took off and the drug was integral to the rise of dance music in the Netherlands in the late-’80s, when the 

 was taking the UK by storm with similar movements bubbling across Europe. MDMA, the key ingredient of ecstasy, was inextricably intertwined with the tidal wave of house music which surfed across the Atlantic from the inner cities of the US to Amsterdam, London and 

. Club culture radiated outwards “in an unstoppable supernova of love”, 

Curiously, the original purveyors in The Netherlands of the so-called chemical of connection, including the man who gave a first ecstasy high to van Bellen — who brought his first house record the next year and was later a resident DJ at 

, RoXY, that brought the genre to Amsterdam — were followers of the cult leader and tantric guru 

. Known as sannyasins, they are understood to have brought ecstasy 

 from the US, where its effects had only 

 become known among New Agers. They did a roaring trade.

But as MDMA’s prevalence increased and the house raves got bigger, the yogi sannyasins were supplanted as the prime source of pills by more organised criminals who already controlled 

 (after first emerging as a force in an illegal post-war cross border butter trade between the Netherlands and Belgium). Those crooks began creating their own Es, known as XTC in The Netherlands. “They didn’t care so much about the quality,” says Pottjewijd. “And so a lot of other things 

 into those pills and accidents happened.” The business also became 

 as gangs began fighting over the bloating bounty.

Could the Netherlands become the first country to legalise MDMA?

Lawyers for the founders of Vancouver's Drug User Liberation Front (DULF) say their clients are being wrongfully criminalized for operating a club that provided untainted drugs to people who would otherwise be at the mercy of a toxic and deadly illicit drug supply.

Lawyers Tim Dickson and Stephanie Dickson outlined a constitutional challenge of Canada's Controlled Drugs and Substances Act on Tuesday, filed in B.C. Supreme Court on behalf of DULF co-founders Jeremy Kalicum and Eris Nyx.

The pair had operated a "compassion club" that sold heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine bought on the dark web and tested for contaminants.

Regulated drug markets

XTC Expo – Final report

Thailand set to U-turn on recreational cannabis use

Thailand set to U-turn on recreational cannabis use

Dutch cannabis growers welcome expansion of state-run experiment to make sales legal

High returns: The economic benefits of UK cannabis legalisation

Contesting cannabis legalization in Nigeria: Hidden narratives of illicit farmers and traders

Beyond punishment: from criminal justice responses to drug policy reform

‘War on drugs has failed, completely and utterly’: UN human rights chief

After the war on drugs: The impacts of cocaine and cannabis regulation in Rio de Janeiro

Cannabis regulation, EU drug law, trade rules and the UN drug control treaties

Could the Netherlands become the first country to legalise MDMA?

Canada: Founders of British Columbia's drug 'compassion club' file Charter challenge