France will introduce a new law by the end of the year to soften punishments for cannabis use, officials say.

The legislation, a key promise of President Emmanuel Macron’s election campaign, will end prison terms for marijuana consumers.

But the changes will stop short of decriminalising use of the drug, according to government spokesman Christophe Castaner.

France is one of half-a-dozen countries in the EU that still criminalises cannabis use, in contrast to Portugal.

Israel’s new cannabis decriminalization policy, approved by the government in March, officially came into effect on Sunday, commencing a new legal approach towards the recreational use of marijuana in the Jewish state.

The new government policy shifts the responsibility of enforcing marijuana laws from police to civil authorities. Yet recreational cannabis use is not fully legalized in Israel, and the Israel Police clarified that “even under the new enforcement policy, cannabis use will stay illegal in the public sector,” reported Yedioth Ahronoth.

Cannabis legalization comes in multiple phases. At least that has been my experience living in Oregon where we voted to legalize cannabis for adult use in 2014.

Many people think that just because a legalization initiative is passed on election day that the fight is over. But the reality is that the battle goes on, just in different ways.

Every single cannabis legalization initiative that has passed in America was not perfect. All of them can and should be improved upon.

One facet of legalization that most states missed was social cannabis use provisions. Cannabis clubs and businesses allowing on-site cannabis use are still prohibited in almost all of the United States.

In 2009, Matthew Kahl of the 101st Airborne Division returned stateside from his first combat deployment. In Afghanistan he had seen firsthand the carnage of explosions set off in crowded street markets. Back on base at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, he tried to put those memories behind him. But echoes of wartime still haunted him as he as he inched through the commissary.

He made his way through the market with his back to the aisles’ shelves, keeping a watchful eye on the bustle. Children toddled behind their mothers, sometimes squealing or crying. Kahl couldn’t stand the crying.

Ohioans wanting medical marijuana have been crossing the border into Michigan, where some Detroit-area dispensaries will sell to out-of-staters who are issued recommendations for cannabis use months ahead of the drug becoming available in their home state, according to officials from a company providing the recommendations.

Those recommendations, given by doctors working for a Toledo business or any other Ohio physician, won’t necessarily help someone in court if they are busted for having pot into Ohio. Possession of less than 100 grams (about 3.5 ounces) is a minor misdemeanor in Ohio with a maximum $150 fine, but could lead to someone losing their driving privileges for six months.

Even attendees at Canada’s biggest cannabis trade show, Lift, on this weekend at Metro Convention Centre, had mixed feelings about legalization, with some worried government control and corporatization would crush the little guy.

Longtime head shop owner Luke Reynolds sees recreational marijuana in Canada eventually rolling out “like Tim Hortons and Starbucks” on every corner.

“It will be government run and I think they’re going to crush all the little guys like us who started this movement in the first place,” said Reynolds, owner of PipeDreamz in Ajax, while selling his vaporizers and pipes for pot smokers at Lift, Canada’s biggest cannabis convention, Saturday in Toronto.

Most medical cannabis advocates can name one key moment in their life when they knew they had to come out of the closet and campaign for regulated, legal access to the cannabis plant.

But there is also a clutch of extraordinary individuals who, when confronted with real evidence about the cannabis plant’s therapeutic potential, have done a 180 degree turn, transforming themselves from herb hater to cannabis campaigner.

1. The Doctor

Dr Sanjay Gupta, chief medical correspondent for CNN, is perhaps the most high profile cannabis critic to come out in favour of the plant. 

One would think the province known for its joie de vivre and laissez-faire attitudes would have the most lenient stance toward the legalization of pot. But a recent survey shows the opposite is true.

Quebecers are far less optimistic about the legalization of marijuana than their counterparts in the rest of Canada, a CROP poll conducted on behalf of CBC's French-language network, Radio-Canada, shows.

For nearly every promised benefit of legalization, from the reduction of the black market to less stress on the justice system, people in Quebec were more skeptical than their counterparts elsewhere in the country.

The results even surprised CROP president Alain Giguère, a veteran pollster.

The changes medical marijuana brings to Arkansas will likely be less widespread than advocates hope or opponents fear, at least at first, recent history and research suggest.

The voter-approved constitutional amendment allowing medical marijuana use will soon fall into place. The state plans to start taking license applications for shops to distribute marijuana products and cultivation facilities in July. The people who qualify to use and possess those products could be able to apply for the necessary state cards even sooner.

Considering how unpopular marijuana was with the public during the mid-1990s, it's phenomenal to take a step back and witness just how rapidly pot's presence has grown in the United States over the past 21 years.

Marveling marijuana's expansion

In 1996, California became the first state to legalize the use of medical cannabis for compassionate use. Since California, 27 additional states and Washington, D.C., have followed. Five new states legalized medical weed last year alone, including Pennsylvania and Ohio, which chose to do so entirely through the legislative process.