In April 2016, the international community will convene for the United Nations General Assembly Special Session on the World Drug Problem (UNGASS). This event, held two years early due to the urgency of the drug situation and intensity of drug-related violence, presents an opportunity to question the fundamentals of international drug policy. Despite overwhelming evidence that a century-long quest to control human behaviour and drug markets through international treaties and national legislation has failed, there is little expectation of change. The vested interests in retaining the status quo are significant, with sclerosis legitimised through the recurrent exhortation to improve international co-operation.

Cannabis News Network launches a miniseries on one of the hottest topics in cannabis regulation: the medicinal benefits of the plant and the struggle of patients to get access to it! Featuring Canada, Australia, Mexico, the United States, and Germany. Watch above.

Is less marijuana entering the US from Mexico today than in years past? According to newly released data provided by the US Border Patrol, the answer may be ‘yes.’

Federal statistics reveal that law enforcement seized an estimated 1.5 million pounds of marijuana at the US/Mexico border in 2015. That total is the lowest amount reported in a decade and continues a steady year-by-year decline in seizure volume that began in 2009, when nearly 4 million tons of cannabis were confiscated.

Pot. Cannabis. Mary Jane. The plant with psychotropic properties has a long pop culture presence — and an even longer record of use.

1. Pot. Weed. Mary Jane. Sticky-icky. Nicknames aside, much of the world calls the psychotropic plant by its scientific name, cannabis, and — until the early 20th century — so did Americans.

2. About a hundred years ago, however, the term marijuana became common in the United States, the result of anti-cannabis, anti-immigrant advocates trying to link recreational use of the plant to migrant workers from Mexico.

A new tack on stemming drug-related violence

JUAN FRANCISCO TORRES LANDA, LL.M. ’90, a corporate attorney in Mexico City, has never used marijuana and doesn’t plan to start now, even though he recently became one of only four people in Mexico granted the right to do so, after a legal battle that went all the way to the country’s Supreme Court.

For him, the fight isn’t about the freedom to grow his own pot or a desire to get high. It’s about the catastrophic violence engulfing his country, fueled by drug trafficking—murders, kidnappings, torture, extortion—and the desperate search for some way, any way, to stop it.

A Langley medicinal marijuana advocate is worried he may not be able to travel abroad safely after he was abruptly ejected from Mexico.

Randy Caine worries that local controversy and opposition to his medical marijuana activism in Langley led to his being labelled a drug dealer by Mexican federal police.

Caine and his wife, Maureen, were on a trip to Puerto Vallarta in March of last year. When they landed, Caine was taken aside by Mexican federal police to an interrogation room, and asked about criminal activities, and if he had ever been arrested.

"They said I had been identified as a drug trafficker and a security threat," Caine said.

Caine was put on the same plane to return to Canada. Maureen had to arrange another flight to follow him.

Residents of Mexico can now officially import Real Scientific Hemp Oil-X™, making it the first legal cannabis product in Mexico.

This historic policy change was led by families in Mexico working directly with government officials, along with support from HempMeds® Mexico.

Medical Marijuana Inc, a pioneer in the industrial hemp business, is betting on Mexico as its next big market as the country opens up to the import of some cannabis-derived products for medical use.

The California-based company manufactures a hemp oil which can, under permits granted this week, be imported to Mexico for the first time to treat specific medical cases. It already supplies a similar product to Brazil.

Stuart Titus, Medical Marijuana's chief executive, said Mexico represented a "$1 billion to $2 billion opportunity" in terms of cumulative revenue over the next 10 years.

A Cannabis plant is pictured at the ''Weed the People'' event as enthusiasts gather to celebrate the legalization of the recreational use of marijuana in Portland, Oregon July 3, 2015. Reuters/Steve Dipaola

Medical Marijuana Inc, a pioneer in the industrial hemp business, is betting on Mexico as its next big market as the country opens up to the import of some cannabis-derived products for medical use.

The California-based company manufactures a hemp oil which can, under permits granted this week, be imported to Mexico for the first time to treat specific medical cases. It already supplies a similar product to Brazil.

The Mexican government is letting the parents of two more sick girls import a cannabis-derived medicine for their treatment.

The Federal Health Commission says in a statement that it has authorized the parents' requests to bring hemp oil into the country.

In a landmark decision last year, a judge ordered the government to allow the parents of another girl suffering from a severe form of epilepsy to import a similar product.

That ruling did not establish a general legal right to import medical marijuana.