Policies – Smoke Master

Cannabis Policies In The Netherlands Have Plenty Of Room To Improve

admin — Fri, 11 Sep 2026 23:49:10 +0000

The Netherlands is well known around the world for its rich history with cannabis. One could easily argue that Amsterdam, the capital of the Netherlands, was the first international cannabis tourism destination. Cannabis consumers have traveled to Amsterdam to partake in local offerings for decades.

In recent years, the Netherlands has ceded, to some degree, its title as the world’s top location for cannabis. Several governments around the world have modernized their laws and regulations to permit various cannabis activities, including cannabis commerce.

Cannabis is now legal for adult use in Uruguay, Canada, Malta, Luxembourg, Germany, South Africa, and Czechia. Recreational cannabis is also legal at the state level in the U.S. in nearly half of the country’s states. Comparatively, while recreational cannabis activity has historically been largely tolerated in the Netherlands, it is not expressly legalized.

Regional adult-use cannabis commerce pilot trials are operating in ten municipalities in the Netherlands. The research-based pilot trials permit participating adults to cultivate, sell, and purchase cannabis in limited instances to gather data and information to help national lawmakers and regulators when crafting national policies. Pilot trials are operating in Almere, Arnhem, Breda, Groningen, Heerlen, Hellevoetsluis, Maastricht, Nijmegen, Tilburg, and Zaanstad.

According to reports from the Netherlands this week, researchers and lawmakers are finding that the unregulated cannabis market in the Netherlands is still thriving, which should not come as a shock given the limited nature of the pilot trials.

“Researchers are currently not seeing any significant differences between municipalities that are participating in the trial and the ones that are not, the first report since the start of the cannabis trial has stated. They do not want to draw any definitive conclusions as of yet.” reported NL Times in its local coverage.

“In questionnaires, cannabis users stated that they often buy their cannabis from outside the coffeeshops due to price, or because they can then buy more per purchase. Municipalities participating in the trial saw prices drop quicker than other areas; however, the price of hashish rose faster than in the other municipalities.” the outlet also reported.

The reported findings at this point should be expected by any objective observer. While the pilot trials are a great option for participants, a vast majority of cannabis consumers in the Netherlands are not participating in the trials. The fact that a proposed expansion of the pilot trial program to Amsterdam was previously denied by members of the Netherlands Parliament, and that the nation’s largest cannabis consumer market is effectively shut out of the pilot trial program, highlights how much more room for cannabis policy improvement there is in the Netherlands.

Until the Netherlands fully embraces the cannabis industry and has a regulated cannabis industry model that is more like what is in place in Canada or at the state level in some U.S. markets, the industry will obviously continue to cede considerable market share to the unregulated market.

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North Carolina Officials Weigh Marijuana And Hemp Policies As Federal Law Remains In Flux

admin — Sat, 05 Sep 2026 20:59:02 +0000

“We are not in any way convinced that we are definitely moving to be a marijuana-legal state. It could happen, but it may not.”

By Clayton Henkel, NC Newsline

When members of the North Carolina House and Senate reconvene in November, they will be faced with having to decide how to regulate intoxicating hemp products. The two chambers were at odds in July over House Bill 328, which would ban hemp with more than 0.4 milligrams of THC and prohibit the sale of any hemp consumables, including CBD, to anyone under 21.

House members opted to wait until after November’s midterm elections, not wanting to upset a $4 billion industry that employs 16,000 people in North Carolina.

In Washington, the hemp industry received a one-month reprieve this week from a national ban on intoxicating hemp products as part of a short-term funding bill. The U.S. House voted to delay the ban from taking effect until December 11, as the White House pushes to delay or somehow fix the national ban. At the same time, the Trump administration has called on the U.S. Department of Justice to reclassify marijuana as a Schedule III drug, the same class as Tylenol with codeine.

While the outlook is hazy, the end of the year could bring big changes for both the hemp and cannabis industries.

Hemp consumables are largely unrestricted in our state, but North Carolina is in the unique minority of states in which marijuana is fully illegal for both recreational and medicinal purposes.

State lawmakers are trying to navigate how to best protect minors from hemp-derived cannabinoids, while also preparing for a future that could include some form of legal cannabis.

39 states, 39 approaches

The North Carolina Advisory Council on Cannabis, appointed in June 2025 by Gov. Josh Stein (D), has been meeting for months to develop a comprehensive approach to regulate cannabis sales and create a safe, legal market for adults that protects kids.

Nearly 40 states have already enacted cannabis regulations, but no two are the same.

Yasha Kahn, co-founder of MCR Labs, has been involved in cannabis testing for more than a decade. Kahn was invited to offer his expertise to the advisory council last week, as that group explores a framework for legalization.

North Carolina policymakers will have to decide on an endless number of variables in regulating cannabis, including who should handle testing and at what point in the process the product should be tested.

Kahn said each state has unique testing requirements with no real consensus. And each state may have its own approach to testing batch sizes, packaging, total THC definitions, and regulatory audits.

“Instead of looking at this as a huge mess, it really is 39 individual experiments on policy with much of the data available that we can analyze,” said Kahn. “We can see which policies have worked, which ones haven’t.”

Kahn said cannabis has the potential to be a multi-billion-dollar industry for North Carolina.

Balancing testing and oversight

The advisory committee will also have to decide whether to use private labs or state labs to test the purity and potency of cannabis if it should become legal. Either way, Kahn recommended the state should require all lab results be made public and shared with state agencies.

“How long would it take to have a testing lab to be up and running and producing results?” asked council member Pat Oglesby.

Kahn said there are hemp labs that would likely be willing to take on the testing for a slice of a booming industry, but establishing an accredited lab from scratch would take time.

“A lot of instruments have months of delays just to be delivered. You have to have capital and good talent,” said Kahn. “I’ve heard of labs opening within maybe nine months. In my experience, it’s closer to a year and a half.”

Privatizing testing, however, comes with risk, Kahn said, as consumer fraud has been documented in multiple states.

A store owner, for example, may find a low THC product is not selling well and urge the cultivator to produce a stronger product. The cultivator may then call the lab and suggest they provide higher THC results, or they will find a new lab to deliver those results.

“This happens in every market that has more than one lab,” Kahn cautioned.

Kahn said this deception becomes easier to trace when the labs are required to share data with the state and those results are made public.

In Colorado, THC potency inflation and the failure to identify mold and other contaminants has legislators considering shifting their cannabis testing to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. Lawmakers there are also considering having state regulators collect the samples to be tested from dispensaries, rather than samples being provided by the producer or cultivators.

Will the industry bloom in North Carolina?

Dr. Larry Greenblatt, state health director and co-chair of the advisory council, said while it may appear that North Carolina is marching toward some form of cannabis legalization, it’s by no means a foregone conclusion.

“We are not in any way convinced that we are definitely moving to be a marijuana-legal state,” said Greenblatt. “It could happen, but it may not.”

The advisory group’s final recommendations, including a detailed look at lab testing, will be included in a report to the governor at the end of this year. It would then be up to the legislature to decide if they want to use the information as the foundation or guidance for a cannabis market in North Carolina.

Stein has said he supports legalization for adults, but Republican lawmakers are divided. Recent attempts to legalize medical marijuana have died in the state House, despite the backing of Senate leaders. And neither chamber has ever voted to legalize the drug for recreational use.

Meantime, other states are moving ahead. In neighboring Virginia, regulators will begin accepting applications for regulated recreational cannabis dispensaries in February, with a retail launch set for July 1, 2027.

This story was first published by NC Newsline.

Photo courtesy of Brian Shamblen.

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The EU’s Proposed Restricitive Nicotine Policies Seem all the More Ridiculous in the Face of Sweden’s Success

admin — Wed, 08 Apr 2026 01:51:19 +0000

There is a widening policy rift across Europe. On one side, there is a large and growing body of scientific evidence in support of tobacco harm reduction. On one hand, the European Commission is pushing an excessively restrictive regulatory agenda that threatens to roll back progress in reducing smoking. Central to this debate is the issue: should all nicotine products be treated equally, irrespective of their risk profile? And the answer to that question is, of course, a definitive no.

Yet this is precisely what the European Union’s current trajectory indicates. Proposed changes to tobacco laws seem headed for stricter limits on vaping, nicotine pouches, and other reduced-risk alternatives. These range from flavour bans, higher taxes and broader classification frameworks that view all nicotine products alongside combustible cigarettes.

This argument is often presented as a precaution, specifically fears regarding youth uptake and nicotine dependence. But it misses a critical distinction: combustion is the key driver of smoking-related disease, not nicotine, even if it is addictive.

Ignoring this detail is particularly worrying when mounted against the large, growing body of evidence indicating vaping and other non-combustible nicotine products are proving effective as a smoking cessation tool. Independent analyses from the Cochrane Collaboration for instance, have consistently shown that nicotine vapes are more effective than conventional nicotine replacement products like patches and gum in helping smokers quit. And countries that have embraced this evidence are already achieving results they can measure.

The proof of what actually works

This cannot be clearer: the EU is tightening while Sweden has gotten rid of smoking to a near-elimination level by taking the exact opposite approach.

The United Kingdom, for instance, has incorporated vaping into its public health approach, resulting in greater quit success and faster declines in smoking. But the most significant example comes from Sweden, where daily smoking has now been reduced to the lowest level ever recorded, at only 3.7 percent. Sweden took the pragmatic route, one of harm reduction — allowing access to lower-risk alternatives, like snus, nicotine pouches, and vaping products, rather than waging a war against smokers with punitive measures like taxes or overly restrictive bans on smoking.

And the findings go beyond patterns of smoking. Both cancer incidence and mortality are notably lower than in the EU average among Swedes, who have much less tobacco-related disease overall. This cannot be clearer: the EU is tightening while Sweden has gotten rid of smoking to a near-elimination level by taking the exact opposite approach.

Yet at the EU level, this evidence is frequently discounted or quoted selectively. In their reports, they concede lower levels of toxicant exposure from alternatives, then jump to potential risk, introducing a new dimension that warrants increased restrictions. That leaves a policy narrative that centers around uncertainty rather than proven successes. Meanwhile, Sweden has done what the rest of Europe (and the rest of the world) is still working toward: reaching a smoke-free status.

Smoking declines stall across Europe

The cost of the EU’s current approach is not theoretical — it exists in economic and behavioral reality. So when safer alternatives are more expensive, less accessible, or just a less appealing option, it gives smokers less incentive to switch. This can undermine cessation rates or even result in unintended consequences like continued cigarette smoking and the expansion of unregulated markets.

Disappointingly, that’s already happening. In some European states, restrictive measures on vaping and nicotine products have been introduced in parallel to stubborn smoking rates and the development of illicit trade routes. Such outcomes undermine both public health and regulatory goals.

Evidence vs ideology: The EU chooses the latter

A more detailed look at recent EU policy discussions reveals an alarming trend. The scientific evidence for why harm reduction works is well established, yet it has not been fully translated into actionable policy recommendations. At the same time, less substantiated fears — including so-called “gateway effect” — are treated with undue rigor even as youth smoking rates have dipped steadily across the continent.

Some experts say this reflects a broader ideological opposition to nicotine itself, rather than an objective analysis of relative risk. If true, this would be a fundamental shift away from outcome-based public health and toward a more prohibitionist model. And the stakes could not be higher.

Tobacco use continues to be the number one cause of preventable death in Europe, killing hundreds of thousands a year. It is thus one of the most pressing public health priorities — accelerating the decline in smoking. Policies that instead inhibit access to effective cessation tools — and fail to support this goal — risk extending the burden of smoking-related disease for yet another generation.

In contrast, countries that embrace risk-proportionate approaches are showing what’s possible. Sweden is the most vivid example, but not the only one. Other countries that took this approach to harm reduction are also showing more rapid declines in smoking, and the message could not be clearer: policy needs to follow science.

From Science to policy failure

Policymakers need to understand the risk continuum of different nicotine products and facilitate access to lower-risk options for adult smokers. Hence, they should regulate proportionately rather than uniformly and focus on real-world outcomes rather than theoretical concerns.

The EU still has a chance to recalibrate its strategy. It can accelerate the path to a smoke-free future by leveraging proven models and applying the full force of science. The battle over nicotine policy in Europe is by no means concluded. But one thing is becoming increasingly clear: Restrictive, one-size-fits-all approaches are not providing the results necessary to end smoking. Sweden has shown what works. The question now is whether the rest of Europe is willing to open its eyes — or follow through on a course that threatens to undo one of the most hopeful public health strategies in a generation.

The Cost of Bad Science: How Flawed Studies And Anti-Nicotine Bias Are Shaping European Tobacco Policy

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