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walkitouthttp://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2015/04/16/rotterdam-klaar-voor-proef-gereguleerde-wietteelt/
I realize that from Stateside, the Netherlands has appeared to be a haven of legal weed for, basically, ever. But it just isn't that simple. Their policy was really more one of non-enforcement than it was of Yeah, Ok, That's Actually Legal. And AFAIK, it never extended to cultivation, leaving the entire trade in a grey zone that's sort of hard for a country with a huge early input from a bunch of literal text reading theocrats to wrap their brains around (<-- little reference to the whole Puritan thing).
Not too long ago (in fact, recently enough that I think I saw earlier coverage go by), several towns/cities in the Netherlands petitioned the government to either legalize/regulate weed cultivation or allow for local experimentation. The petition was known as the "Joint Regulation". And that is not a translation. Which leads me to believe that it was an intended English-language pun.
Weirdly, it seems that the Netherlands, Washington State and other states in the US will all arrive at a complete regulatory scheme (from cultivation to consumption, with quality control and regulations designed to discourage criminal activities at every step) at more or less the same time.
I realize that from Stateside, the Netherlands has appeared to be a haven of legal weed for, basically, ever. But it just isn't that simple. Their policy was really more one of non-enforcement than it was of Yeah, Ok, That's Actually Legal. And AFAIK, it never extended to cultivation, leaving the entire trade in a grey zone that's sort of hard for a country with a huge early input from a bunch of literal text reading theocrats to wrap their brains around (<-- little reference to the whole Puritan thing).
Not too long ago (in fact, recently enough that I think I saw earlier coverage go by), several towns/cities in the Netherlands petitioned the government to either legalize/regulate weed cultivation or allow for local experimentation. The petition was known as the "Joint Regulation". And that is not a translation. Which leads me to believe that it was an intended English-language pun.
Weirdly, it seems that the Netherlands, Washington State and other states in the US will all arrive at a complete regulatory scheme (from cultivation to consumption, with quality control and regulations designed to discourage criminal activities at every step) at more or less the same time.