Cannabis remains illegal as ministers push through a law controlling its use by the public

[webfact]

Deputy Prime Minister Wissanu Krea-ngam has warned marijuana users, in the kingdom, to hold off on openly using the still proscribed drug for recreational purposes at this time. It comes after new groundbreaking regulations were approved this week which will eventually decriminalise the narcotic. Mr Wissanu warned that such activity is still strictly illegal with severe legal provisions in force, which could lead to consequential jail terms for those caught using or dealing with the substance. It has emerged that the government is planning to push through a new law that will strictly restrict both the personal use of cannabis and its commercial use by private interests, over the coming 4 months. The legislation aims to make sure that Thailand meets its international commitments to help control and regulate the use of the narcotic both within and without its borders.

 

by James Morris and Son Nguyen

 

Thailand is now entering into a grey area until growing cannabis at home becomes legal but after this, it will be controlled by a new law, now being pushed through parliament that will aim to severely restrict the consumption and sale of cannabis and associated products in Thailand.

 

Thailand’s Deputy Prime Minister, Wissanu Krea-ngam, this week, warned those seeking to get high on cannabis, that recreational use of the drug in Thailand remains strictly illegal. He explained that a new law being pushed through parliament will regulate the use of cannabis including requiring anyone who deals in the substance to obtain a licence and specifying that the strength of cannabis product be well below the level normally associated with users getting high on the illegal drug.

 

The government’s legal experts referred to Thailand’s international commitments to control the use of the drug. ‘The bill will show the country remains vigilant and committed to keeping the use of cannabis in check.’ he said. Mr Wissanu also highlighted the difficulty the government and law agencies will face in controlling recreational cannabis use under the proposed new regime following significant moves this week to decriminalise what, for now, remains a Category 5 narcotic. 

 

Full story: https://www.thaiexaminer.com/thai-news-foreigners/2022/01/29/cannabis-remains-illegal-new-law-pushed/

 

-- © Copyright Thai Examiner 2022-01-31

 

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[daveAustin]

What a waste of time. That stuff was put on the earth for a reason and it wasn’t to make handbags. Guess it’ll keep the stiffer side of the TV membership happy though. 

[timendres]

1 hour ago, webfact said:

Thailand meets its international commitments to help control and regulate the use of the narcotic both within and without its borders

What "international commitments"?

These folks have a huge opportunity to lead, instead of following the retarded.

[ChaiyaTH]

Cannabis will be legal, cannabis is illegal, cannabis is legal for medical consumption now officially. Medical cannabis only up to 0.20% is legal, average of plants 4% and higher. Cannabis is now legal, activists celebrate. 

People can have plants but not the crops, now new laws for people growing it for recreational use. Today's news cannabis is llegal. So all the news in the past months was complete nonsense and a waste of time is what it says. 

For the medical part; soon they figure some type of patients do benefit from high THC contents aside CBD, and law needs revision again. Anyway, my local green hippie seller since 9 years will be happy with all this I guess.

[ChaiyaTH]

6 minutes ago, timendres said:

What "international commitments"?

These folks have a huge opportunity to lead, instead of following the retarded.

They were so close to actually leading at something for once, that would also bring a lot of tax money in + revive some niche tourism. To be expanded to even bigger projects such as producing plastic alternatives from hemp.

As always they need to shoot themselves in the feet so that a few elites can have all the big licenses and get rich. Last youtube i have seen for people caught using it was 3K fines by court.

[ChaiyaTH]

34 minutes ago, daveAustin said:

What a waste of time. That stuff was put on the earth for a reason and it wasn’t to make handbags. Guess it’ll keep the stiffer side of the TV membership happy though. 

No it was for making the VOC ships sail and rich lol. Maybe they can make submarines with it in Thailand's 4.0 program.

[Puwa]

Sounds like Wissanu etc al want a bigger piece of the pie. 

[jacko45k]

1 hour ago, daveAustin said:

What a waste of time. That stuff was put on the earth for a reason and it wasn’t to make handbags. Guess it’ll keep the stiffer side of the TV membership happy though. 

Both good and bad things have been put on this Earth, but I am too agnostic to think it was all by some design.

[freedomnow]

2 hours ago, webfact said:

Thailand is now entering into a grey area

Thailand is the rules grey area centre of the universe.

Yes/no...

Can/can't...

Open/closed....

FLIP-FLOP.

[sirineou]

1 hour ago, timendres said:

What "international commitments"?

These folks have a huge opportunity to lead, instead of following the retarded.

Unfortunately it is not that simple. 

From what I briefly read elsewhere, If I understand this correctly, Thailand has international agreement to control the spread of cannabis production, these international agreements are tied in with other issues.

  In order for Thailand to make the production of cannabis legal , it needs to disengage and renegotiate such international agreements,

Unilaterally withdrawing from them could have unforeseen consequences.  

[Paulaew]

1 minute ago, sirineou said:

Unfortunately it is not that simple. 

From what I briefly read elsewhere, If I understand this correctly, Thailand has international agreement to control the spread of cannabis production, these international agreements are tied in with other issues.

  In order for Thailand to make the production of cannabis legal , it needs to disengage and renegotiate such international agreements,

Unilaterally withdrawing from them could have unforeseen consequences.  

There are 3 UN treaties on the control of cannabis: the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, the   1971 Convention on Psychotropic  Substances,  and the 1988 Convention against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic  Drugs and Psychotropic  Substances.

 

Countries that have legalized recreational use of cannabis are Canada, Georgia, Malta, Mexico, South Africa, and Uruguay, plus 18 states, 2 territories, and the District of Columbia in the United States and the Australian Capital Territory in Australia.

 

These countries have defied the outdated prohibitions on cannabis usage, with no ill effects. Change on drug policies has to come from the bottom up, we cannot wait for the UN to change these treaties, it would take decades.

 

There are precedents for Thailand to follow in the legalization of cannabis. Reference to the UN treaties is just an excuse for the powers-that-be to manage the sale and distribution of cannabis for their own benefit.

 

Paul Laew

 

 

 

[ezzra]

On a one hand, soon, you will be able to grow marijuana freely and on the other you can use it, now i'm looking for marijuana precipices for salads and cookies baking, anyone have any?...

[Denim]

I have something to say to the government.

 

' Don't Bogart that joint , my friends , pass it over to me. You're still hanging on to it , and I sure could use a hit. 

[hotchilli]

3 hours ago, webfact said:

It has emerged that the government is planning to push through a new law that will strictly restrict both the personal use of cannabis and its commercial use by private interests, over the coming 4 months.

Only for the government profiteers.

[JustAnotherHun]

End of wishful thinking...

[mtls2005]

Yeah, the international treaty excuse is just that, an excuse trotted out every so often as a reason to go slower.

 

https://news.un.org/en/story/2020/12/1079132

 

 

 

Drafts of this new Act have been published on thai media and pro-cannabis websites and FB pages.

 

https://www.isranews.org/article/isranews-scoop/106161-isranews_new-8.html?fbclid=IwAR2olDqyISF9l4D8t0mFIdkgszqT0B5xfP67tbW9cDEBsB8rj1UTzjqOloY

 

For the Draft Marijuana, Hemp Act, B.E..... proposed by Mr. Anutin and the Bhumjaithai Party MPs, divided into 11 chapters and 44 sections, specifying principles and reasons that people have the right to Take care of your health and encourage the best use of cannabis, hemp. Therefore, it should be supported to be used for research studies. Medical benefits, health, community lifestyle use as well as providing opportunities for production, sale, import, export or possession to promote agriculture, industry and the national economy; and to protect consumers to consume cannabis Inappropriate hemp which may be harmful to consumers It is appropriate to establish regulatory measures to control sales, advertising and consumption. to protect the health of a person therefore it is necessary to enact this Act

 

 

 

It appears to cover "licensed" production.

 

It still contains severe punishments for unauthorized growing, unauthorized use: 3 years and 300,000 baht.

 

It does allow for home-growing but the exact details, process are still confusing. Some say you just need to notify government officials of your grow, no pre-approval, fees.

 

Assuming the Act is passed it would take a further 120 days to come into law.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[IAMHERE]

Wonder if they are just coming up with rules and regulations so you may be caught out in a bribable position?

[malibukid]

when will Thailand grow up?  it's the 21st. century, hello.

[malibukid]

2 hours ago, ChaiyaTH said:

They were so close to actually leading at something for once, that would also bring a lot of tax money in + revive some niche tourism. To be expanded to even bigger projects such as producing plastic alternatives from hemp.

As always they need to shoot themselves in the feet so that a few elites can have all the big licenses and get rich. Last youtube i have seen for people caught using it was 3K fines by court.

Thailand is it's own worst enemy

[sirineou]

59 minutes ago, Paulaew said:

There are precedents for Thailand to follow in the legalization of cannabis. Reference to the UN treaties is just an excuse for the powers-that-be to manage the sale and distribution of cannabis for their own benefit.

Are you sure there are no other agreements  with neighboring  countries? 

[mrfill]

2 hours ago, timendres said:

What "international commitments"?

These folks have a huge opportunity to lead, instead of following the retarded.

Exactly the same international commitments that many other countries, who have legalised or decriminalised cannabis, comply with.

This commentary from the LSE explains in full detail  https://jied.lse.ac.uk/articles/10.31389/jied.23/

[KhunLA]

At least it will be decriminalized a bit.  To the point, hopefully in the future, ignored for any enforcement as in the USA.  Where police don't bother, as not worth any effort, or to waste their time.

 

 

[metisdead]

An off topic post about the recycling of plastics has been removed.

[GeorgeCross]

the first question you would expect a competent government (who is serious about legalisation) to ask is "how do other countries such as canada and germany get around their commitments to these UN treaties?"

 

if they are not asking this question and/or having a team of lawyers crawl over the answers/edicts then we can safely assume they are one of two things:

 

1) not serious 

 

2) incompetent

 

i'm going with option one, not serious. this is all political theatre with the aim of fulfilling anutin's election commitment without actually fulfilling it. because without him, and thamannat and prayut both dead in the water they are TOAST at the next election

 

[bobbin]

Quelle surprise!!

 

What happened to recreational sandboxes?

 

I think the above poster raises a valid point... but I expect push-back from Anutin because this obviously is not what he has been saying and advocating...

[spidermike007]

My guess? This is all about the lobbying done on behalf of the RTP. These franchisees stand to lose a fortune in revenue. I know of people who have been asked to cough up 100,000 baht for possession of two joints on Koh Phangan. These goons are buying villas with that cash stream. We knew they would put up a fight. Just creeps being creeps and holding the nation back. 

[KhunLA]

Just now, spidermike007 said:

My guess? This is all about the lobbying done on behalf of the RTP. These franchisees stand to lose a fortune in revenue. I know of people who have been asked to cough up 100,000 baht for possession of two joints on Koh Phangan. These goons are buying villas with that cash stream. We knew they would put up a fight. Just creeps being creeps and holding the nation back. 

Yes, one does suspect why some fines with jail sentences are so ridiculously high.  One might believe the bar is so high, as to assist with 'negotiating' a high tea payment to avoid arrest.  Drone laws are a fine example.  The common Thai folk aren't going to be buying, let alone operating $300 & up drones, or able to pay silly fines with threat of imprisonment, so one does wonder who the laws are targeting.

 

How many fines in the non-3rd world countries are a week's, months or a year's worth of salary.  With the added fear of imprisonment for a non violent, victimless 'crime'.

[bobbin]

Further to Anutin's position..

 

I saw a video from his election campaign..

 

He was telling the assembled "Pee/Nong" that it could be sold for the Baht equivalent of $2000 a kilo, That's not leaves.

[mtls2005]

42 minutes ago, bobbin said:

Further to Anutin's position..

 

Referred to as "The California Model" in BJT propaganda.

 

No clue why the ran on this, or are pushing it now. All very strange. Barely a sliver of the electorate cares about this issue.

 

I guess they want to be perceived as making progress?

 

 

 

 

 

 

[spidermike007]

1 hour ago, mtls2005 said:

 

Referred to as "The California Model" in BJT propaganda.

 

No clue why the ran on this, or are pushing it now. All very strange. Barely a sliver of the electorate cares about this issue.

 

I guess they want to be perceived as making progress?

 

 

 

 

 

 

It can barely be labeled a form of progress, if recreational use of pot is not part of the new law. It is simply the continuation of an extremely lucrative franchise, for the RTP.