Dutch govt seeks to close cannabis 'grow shops'

[Hashassin]

Wonder what will happen to Dutch seed breeders if this goes through. If selling seeds retail gets banned you'd think wholesale selling will too..

Dutch govt seeks to close cannabis 'grow shops'

9:03 a.m. March 6, 2008

AMSTERDAM – Shops selling cannabis seeds and specialist equipment for cultivating marijuana plants face closure under proposed changes to Dutch drugs laws.

Justice Minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin told parliament he would amend laws to ban the sale of everything that 'facilitates the production of cannabis', news agency ANP reported on Thursday.

A majority of lawmakers said in November they supported such a move.

So-called 'grow shops' often offer clients full advice on how to grow marijuana at home, an activity illegal in the Netherlands, Christian Democrat lawmakers have said.

Soft drugs are officially banned in the Netherlands but under a policy of tolerance, buyers are allowed to have less than 5 grams of cannabis in their possession.

In recent years the country has sought to shed its 'anything goes' image and has tightened laws on drug use and prostitution.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/world/20080306-0903-dutch-drugs.html

[Bad Muthafucka]

I'm not being funny, but Amsterdam needs sorting out. I can't even stop for a coffee without being offered weed.

[D]

I'm not being funny, but Amsterdam needs sorting out. I can't even stop for a coffee without being offered weed.

Lmfao! :D

Am' is getting pretty fucked up now, I blame all the other countries forcing them to change their ways.

[Bad Muthafucka]

I blame myself. I'm just too bad.

[D]

I blame myself. I'm just too bad.

You're so bad even Osama Bin Laden bows down

I salute you. :mr:

[yavana]

This is just going to increase the criminality that they've been complaining about in the sex trade. By closing down semi-legit grow shops and going tooth and nail after Dutch grow operations, they're pushing the grows into Germany, Belgium, France, etc. And that pisses everyone off, because it's mostly criminals that run cannabis across the border.

I don't see why they don't just decriminalize growing marijuana in the Netherlands. Obviously, they know that the coffee shops are getting their cannabis from somewhere - wouldn't they prefer that it be the shop owner or a business partner (that you can tax, hold accountable, etc) than trans-border drug runners?

I completely agree with their push to crack down on what the Red Light District has turned into. The RLD's main business, prostitution, has transformed from a cottage industry of mostly Dutch pimps and Dutch hookers that was mostly non-violent and pro-health into an industry of Albanian, Macedonia, Serbian, and Moldovian pimps who literally abduct and enslave women using violence and hard drugs. That needs to be stopped, these women are not choosing to be prostitutes - they are sex slaves.

The other thing that needs to be changed is the perception of us folk that travel to Amsterdam because we love to smoke. Why is it that when my dad goes to France to get drunk on wine, he's a desirable wine connoisseur and when I got the the NL I'm an undesirable drug tourist?

[MRattu]

:thefinger: spamming twat.

[Ironlung]

The way things are going in america and then you look at this..
Just makes me think the government are starting to want control of it because of the money they can get .
Get tougher on the people round the world and at the same time making it legal in america if you get it from them ???
Somethings smelling very fishy about the cannabis laws in the last year..

[THOMAS CHONG]

ther allways trying to do this