Cannabis is coming out of the shadows in Italy. In Rome, Carlo Monaco and Luigi Mantuano recently opened a patient-operated cannabis café run in the citadel of San Lorenzo, a few blocks south of the city’s central rail station. And in Bologna, Luca Maria Cauterucci and his partners at Foglie d’Erba, or Leaves of Grass, have launched an unusual new shop of their own.

The mayor of Tilburg, the sixth-largest city in the Netherlands, has indicated that authorities will allow residents who rely on medicinal cannabis to grow up to five plants for personal use without fear of prosecution. The move is a clean break with existing policy, under which medical growers face evictions and seizure of their plants.

Mayor Peter Noordanus announced the news in a letter to local patient organization PGMCG (Patients Group Medicinal Cannabis Users). Marian Hutten, chairwoman of the group, called the official permission an “excellent, cool step of the mayor.”

In Spain, grassroots social movements have come together to help build a system where individuals can lawfully purchase and consume cannabis. Thanks to activists working from the bottom up, there are now hundreds of cannabis social clubs across the country. Now a new and long-neglected focus of cannabis culture is finally coming to the fore: feminism.

Whether you are opposed to their presence of not, legalised cannabis markets are here to stay. 

In April, Pennsylvanina become the 24th state to approve cannabis for medical purposes in the US, while it is already legal to all over-21s in four states and Washington DC. 

In the same month, Germany joined a host of European countries in creating medical cannabis legislation. Further afield, Australia, Uruguay and Brazil announced cannabis programmes last year and Canada is transitioning from a medical regime to a full adult-use market. 

Some suggest the legal cannabis market could reach $50bn in raw cannabis sales within ten years, others suggest figures closer to $300bn.

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Cannabis Ancestor There’s a lot we don’t know about the evolution of cannabis, and we’re still not sure exactly what’s going on with cannabis as it exists today – it is one species or several? What does “sativa” and “indica” mean in real terms? We’re still finding the answers to those questions, and a deeper understanding of the past could help our efforts enormously.

The early evolution of cannabis is mostly unknown, and scientists still haven’t reached firm conclusions on exactly what’s going on with cannabis as it exists today – it is one species or several? What does “sativa” and “indica” mean in real terms? We’re still finding the answers to those questions, and a deeper understanding of the past could help our efforts enormously.

Whether cannabis in a given jurisdiction is fully legal, strictly prohibited, or anything in between, cannabis supporters and opponents are unanimous on one thing: Herbs don’t belong in the hands of children. For medical cannabis patients in Germany who are parents, that means an obligation to store medicine in place that kids can’t get to it. Under the country’s narcotics security rules, patients with a medical card must keep the cannabis they buy at the pharmacy in a mini-safe at home.

A new report shows that the Netherlands is the leading supplier of drugs among dark net vendors.

Internet-facilitated drugs trade was released by the Dutch Justice Ministry and took into consideration the size, scope, and the role the Netherlands is playing in the online drug business.

Researchers scanned 50 dark net markets and vendor shops to find that the Netherlands calls a very huge portion of the markets and sites home.

In part with data from the European Monitoring Center for Drugs and Drug Addiction, the study suggests that the Netherlands is the main producer of MDMA and Ecstasy, as well as a key distribution hub from cannabis resin and cocaine.

Inhabitants of Copenhagen neighbourhood tear down market stalls selling hash after suspected dealer shoots two police officers.

Residents of the self-proclaimed autonomous Christiania neighbourhood in Copenhagen have torn down market stalls selling hash after a man shot two police officers and a bystander.

One of the officers is in a critical condition and the other officer and the bystander are stable after the incident on Wednesday, police said. The 25-year-old gunman, a suspected drug dealer, fled the scene and was later injured in a shootout with police south of the city. He died at Copenhagen university hospital.

If you’ve been following drug policy developments in recent months, you will no doubt have heard that Germany is on the brink of legalising medical cannabis.

The details of the new law – which was presented to parliament in July, and is expected to come into force by the end of the year – have been discussed at length in the press. Cannabis will, for the first time, be covered by public health insurance, patients will be able to obtain their cannabis on prescription from a pharmacy, and those who wish to take advantage of the new system will (according to some reports) be required to first obtain a letter from their physician stating that cannabis is a last resort.