Although the United Nations international drug treaties have upheld an official prohibition against marijuana, the marijuana industry has spread across the Americas, Europe, and Asia.

CANNABIS should be legalised to bring Britain up to speed with a growing number of Western countries and end the “embarrassment” of domestic drugs policy, a cross-party group of MPs have said.

Former deputy prime minster Nick Clegg and former health minister Norman Lamb joined Labour and Tory figures to back a new report which claimed legalisation could net the Treasury more than £1 billion a year in tax revenue.

The Adam Smith Institute and Volteface study argued that the UK should follow the lead of the United States, where four further states legalised marijuana in this month’s elections.

It came as Germany gets ready to legalise cannabis for medical purposes and Canada prepares for all-out decriminalisation.

As people are celebrating the legal sale of marijuana in the US, the burgeoning cannabis industry has gone from a curiosity to a bonafide booming market.

A new report by a leading marijuana industry investment and research firm found that legal cannabis sales jumped 17%, to $5.4 billion, in 2015 and they will grow by a whopping 25% this year to reach $6.7 billion in total US sales.

According to an INC.com report, there are also sizable and completely legal industries outside of the US, like Israel's 10-year-old medical industry. As governments from Germany to Australia to the UK are on the verge of legalising some form of marijuana, the global opportunity is coming into focus.

The UK’s underground medical marijuana scene, where dealers give away tens of thousands of pounds worth of cannabis in order to offer relief to those in physical pain, has been exposed in a new documentary.

Millions of people across can gain access to medical marijuana to treat the pain of chronic and fatal diseases. 

Those caught supplying marijuana risk being handed a 14-year prison sentence in the UK.

The UK’s underground medical marijuana scene, where dealers give away tens of thousands of pounds worth of cannabis in order to offer relief to those in physical pain, has been exposed in a new documentary.

Millions of people across can gain access to medical marijuana to treat the pain of chronic and fatal diseases. 

Drugs are a public health issue, and should be legalised with Doctors at the heart of the debate according to the British Medical Journal.

In a series of articles published today, the BMJ argue that ‘the war on drugs has failed,’ and claim that prohibitive drug laws have done nothing to reduce addiction or organised crime.

The BMJ’s editorial highlights a number of areas where ‘the war on drugs’ has actually caused public health problems, as opposed to remedying them:

The war on drugs has failed and doctors should lead calls for change, one of the world's top medical journals has said.

The British Medical Journal says illegal drug use is increasing and alternative policies are needed urgently.

A set of radical proposals has been published in the BMJ, which was founded in 1840 and is seen as a leading voice in the medical community.

The journal says penalties for drug use should be scrapped and governments should regulate legal drug markets.

“The War on Drugs” is the brainchild of president Nixon; this declaration from June 1971 created an influx of misinformation, suppressed research and has prevented the evolution of the most versatile drug for medicinal use known to mankind.

Denial

From California to the Baltic, the dam is breaking. Meanwhile, the British government sticks to its ‘war on drugs’, and pays the heavy price.

How did the world change on 8 November 2016? No, it was not the election of Donald Trump. It was the passage of California’s proposition 64, removing legal controls on the production and sale of marijuana.

Last Sunday, around 150 activists, academics, and journalists, gathered in Leicester to attend the first Annual General Meeting of United Kingdom’s Cannabis Social Clubs. 

A cafe space in Leicester was transformed into a forum for political action, as those who attended hoped this meeting would be a step along the path to significant legislative changes in the UK. It is the first event of its kind in the UK, and, significantly, it was left unhindered by police or any other authorities – this in itself a sign of progress.