Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto has proposed legalising marijuana for medical purposes and easing limits for personal use of the drug.

He said he would be sending a bill to the Congress to increase the amount users can legally carry from the current five grams to 28 (0.18-1oz).

He had previously opposed efforts to liberalise Mexico's tough drug laws.

Tens of thousands of people have been killed in drug-related violence in Mexico in recent years.

"We, Mexicans, know all too well the range and the defects of prohibitionist and punitive policies, and of the so-called war on drugs that has prevailed for 40 years,'' President Pena Nieto said on Thursday.

Adam Eidinger had been sending letters to the White House asking for a meeting since he led a successful ballot measure fight to legalize pot in the nation’s capital.

The letters asked for a “Bud Summit” with President Obama’s drug policy advisers to talk about removing pot from the nation’s list of most dangerous drugs.

“Doobies,” the dude shouted Wednesday morning, from an empty stage. “There will be doobies. Lots of them.” He paused, looked around. “Free doobies, for anyone here.”

The dude was getting bummed. There were few doobie takers outside the Vancouver Art Gallery, traditional home of what’s become an annual marijuana celebration. It’s also known as 4/20, for the date on which it falls.

There were bewildered tourists, mostly, and local businesspeople and random passers-by. A dozen police officers were on hand. They looked bored.

The real action Wednesday was down at the beach, near English Bay, where the city’s dialled-in 4/20 promoters were staging a massive, open-air marijuana market and rally, perhaps the largest ever seen in Canada.

Canada’s provinces should each get leeway on the way they sell, tax and control marijuana once the drug is legalized by the federal government, according to a new report by the C.D. Howe Institute.

The framework suggested by economist Anindya Sen would create a patchwork of rules across Canada, with different laws governing everything from the stores that can carry the drug to the penalties for selling to underage users.

In this “joint venture,” the federal government would monitor the safe production of marijuana for recreational use, while the provinces would oversee distribution, with an eye to meeting public-health goals.

Tommy Chong of Cheech and Chong fame, the standup/movie/music icon, has added entrepreneur to his list of achievements. But the businessman is staying in character with the Tommy Chong we have all grown to know and love.

It's all about weed.

His latest product line is called Chong's Choice, and according to Instagram, it is "a national legal and medicinal brand you can finally trust."

In 2014, his new business venture in Colorado, where cannabis production and sales are legal, began manufacturing 2 products for distribution:

While supporters of presidential candidate Bernie Sanders have lost track of how many times they’ve heard his oft-touted figure of $27 — the average donation to Sanders’ campaign — the marijuana-minded vote is looking to alter that average, if only for one day.

With cannabis holiday 420 quickly approaching, some Sanders supporters have started an online campaign, encouraging others to donate $4.20 (or $42 or $420) to Sanders’ war chest on April 20 to “send a message to the establishment that alone, we’re harmless bees, but together, we’re a ferocious swarm that will not be silenced.”

Speaking at a United Nations General Assembly Special Session on drugs, being held in New York from April 19-21, Mexico’s President Enrique Peña Nieto said Tuesday that he supported the legalization of marijuana for medical and scientific purposes, as well as increasing the amount of cannabis that can be legally possessed for personal consumption.

Speaking at the special session — a gathering of world leaders to discuss, for the first time in two decades, the strategy for the war on drugs — the Mexican president reportedly said that drug users should not be criminalized, and that drug use should be treated as a “public health problem.”

Fortune takes a look at the influencers on 4/20. 

America’s marijuana industry has bloomed in recent years with voters in more and more states voting to legalize pot in some form as public opinion on the drug seems to evolve with each generation.

I have no idea whether the clerical staff at the United Nations chose to schedule this year's General Assembly Special Session on Narcotic Drugs (UNGASS) during 420 week as some kind of wry commentary or winking joke, but the timing feels right; there's a certain harmony between a global holiday to celebrate cannabis civil disobedience and a reform agenda to de-escalate the global drug war. 

Yes, you read that right: after decades of impotent rhetoric describing a fictional "world without drugs," the United Nations is coming together, even as you read this, to work out a ceasefire on the War on Drugs.

New Zealand should follow NSW and allow terminally ill people to use cannabis without the threat of being charged, the NZ Drug Foundation says.

NZ Drug Foundation principal policy advisor Andrew Zielinski said the government should consider adopting a scheme similar to that of New South Wales, where patients could access cannabis without fear of prosecution.

"People register as having a terminal disease ... than them or their caregiver won't be prosecuted by the New South Wales police for using whatever cannabis that they can source."

Mr Zielinski said the adverse effects of the drug were less of an issue with people who were terminally ill.