Although Lesotho legalized cannabis exports in 2018, Africa has been a slow starter in joining the ranks of those countries pushing for reform and regulated markets. Although fewer than a quarter of the continent’s countries have partially legalized cannabis, primarily medical cannabis for export and industrial hemp, Africa has the potential to be a future powerhouse on the international cannabis stage. Stay in the loop with all the news, policy, legislative, regulatory and market developments with Cannabiz Africa, your reliable content guide to the African cannabis environment.
Kenya has a stable, thriving cannabis retail market that links cities and villages, builds rural economies and offers the poor a means of wealth creation. Yet it’s all illegal in the eyes of the Nairobi government officials, who remain blinded to the plant’s potential in helping its own citizens.
Ganja Users of Namibia president Brian Jaftha (pictured here) says his organization has decided to form a political party to push for the legalization of cannabis. This after the Windhoek High Court dismissed GUN’s challenge, saying the ultimate legalization decision should be taken by policy-makers, not the courts.
The Windhoek High Court has dismissed the Ganja Users of Namibia (GUN) application to overturn colonial-era cannabis prohibition laws. However, this does not mean the State has rejected cannabis legalization; its lawyers successfully argued that this was a policy decision best handled by the legislature and not by the courts.
Kush is the West African word for a high potency polydrug cocktail of cannabis laced with synthetic opioids such as nitazene. It’s high addiction rate has seen its use amongst the youth soar to such an extent that the UN has identified it as a public health crisis engulfing the region as a whole.
Mauritius has been hearing public submissions on relaxing it’s prohibitive cannabis laws. The Lalit Hospitality Group made a wide-ranging submission to the National Agency for Drug Control to halt arrests, create a regulated adult-use and medical cannabis sector and allow people to grow their own ‘gandya’.
The Moroccan film, Halima, about the Kingdom’s illicit cannabis trade has swept Shanghai’s International Film Festival with Yassine El Idrissi (pictured here) and actress Khadija scooping the best director and best actress Golden Goblet awards respectively .
Soweto Cannabis Association founder Tia Ramfate (pictured here) says community participation is essential in developing a uniquely African cannabis framework. She said South Africa could teach the world how to create a people-centric regulatory regime that was not locked into First World rules.
Leading Swiss cannabis expert Paul-Lukas Good has urged Morocco to go take its cannabis policies to a logical conclusion and legalize general adult use consumption. He said the Kingdom had a sound cannabis reform trajectory but would not realise its true potential by developing only industrial and medical cannabis.
Ghana has opened the door to developing an industrial hemp sector, but there are now calls for authorities to go further and embrance regulated adult use. A five point plan towards decriminalization has been put on the table by a leading advocate for cannabis reform.
Zimbabwe’s policy to legalise the production of medicinal cannabis is bearing fruit, with a multi-million-dollar value-addition facility in Headlands now transforming the “green gold” into high-end CBD pharmaceutical products.
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