During its seven years of existence, Cannafest, which bills itself as “the international trade show of cannabis and medical herbs,” has evolved from a quaint local event in the Czech Republic to one of the largest and most popular cannabis fairs in the world. Prague is already gearing up to host this year’s three-day fair, set to kick off Nov. 11.

The Transvaal pharmacy in The Hague, the seat of Dutch government, is the only place in the Netherlands where patients can buy whole plant cannabis oil of guaranteed quality. Pharmacist Armin Ramcharan distills the oil from three different varieties of cannabis grown by Bedrocan, a medical cannabis producer. Patients from as far afield as Italy travel to The Hague to buy it.

Hash oil is considered a hard drug under Dutch law, in the same category as heroin or cocaine. This is why Bedrocan, the country’s only legal medical cannabis grower, cannot produce oil. The company’s license is limited to cultivating cannabis flower.

Prohibition The ban on cannabis was supposed to protect society from the threats of murder, mayhem, addiction, and full-scale collapse that were trumpeted by everyone from politicians to Parent Teacher Associations. Nearly a century later, its illegality has caused the very problems it was intended to solve. So who benefits from cannabis prohibition really?

It’s a scorching day in Denver. You’re at the annual Great American Beer Festival, about to end the parched torment of your mouth with a cool, refreshing first sip of craft beer. It touches your lips and you pull back… what the heck? It tastes like weed! Is this just a particularly skunky brew, or did you just get a taste of a bold new fusion between beer and cannabis?

For the first time in Germany, a court has allowed a patient to cultivate their own cannabis for medicinal purposes. The 53-year-old man suffers from multiple sclerosis (MS).

Germany's Federal Institute for Drugs and Medical Devices (BfArM) confirmed on Sunday that the patient from Mannheim, southwestern Germany, will be allowed to grow a maximum of 130 cannabis plants a year in his bathroom. The cannabis is strictly for personal use, a spokesperson said.

In Christiania, Denmark, after a shoot-out between a known drug dealer and police officers, cannabis-friendly residents have decided that the unregulated drug market in their midst needs to end.

“Pusher Street” in Christiania, a semi-autonomous cannabis hippy haven in the middle of Copenhagen, is struggling with its identity right now as one of the most pot-friendly enclaves in any European city outside of Amsterdam.

After a backroom meeting between political party leaders, a slim majority of Dutch Parliament has aligned behind a proposal to regulate the flow of cannabis that feeds the country’s coffeeshops. If enacted, the new system would bring the Netherlands closer to the legal, adult-use markets emerging across North America.

Sales by coffeeshops of small amounts of cannabis are tolerated in the Netherlands, but the coffeeshops currently don’t have a legal way to obtain product, as commercial grows and wholesale distribution are forbidden. To remedy this so-called backdoor paradox, the Dutch bill would create a system of licensed producers to cultivate cannabis under government supervision and supply the coffeeshops.

Recreational marijuana use is not permitted in public in Barcelona, but that hasn’t stopped non-profit cannabis clubs and discrete smoker lounges from popping up all over the Catalan region.

There are over 800 smokers clubs in Spain now compared to the mere 40 in the country in 2010. Despite the influx of clubs, patrolling public smoking isn’t at the top of the Spanish police’s to-do list.

With memories of the Global Medicinal Cannabis Summit: Advancements in the Age of Cannabis still fresh in our minds, VolteFace has been particularly fortunate to receive the following in-depth review of the event – penned by Dr Callum Swift, who graduated with an MA in Neuroscience from Trinity College, Dublin.

Cigarette and alcohol use among 15- and 16-year-olds is declining across Europe but the numbers using cannabis are growing, an EU survey shows.

The Espad report for 2015 includes most EU countries, but not Germany or the UK, and data for Spain is incomplete. 

In 2015 "current smokers" accounted for 21% of those surveyed, and the highest total was in Italy (37%). 

In 1995-2015 those using alcohol in the past 30 days fell from 56% to 47%. Top in cannabis use were the Czechs (37%).

That figure for Czech teenagers reporting a lifetime experience of cannabis was higher than the level in the US - 31% in comparable surveys.