Legal Marijuana Is Doing What Drug War Couldn't: Cutting Into Mexican Cartel Profits Christopher Ingraham - The Washington Post
go to original March 4, 2016

Is Legal Marijuana Threatening Mexican Drug Cartels? (TestTube News)

The latest data from the U.S. Border Patrol shows that last year, marijuana seizures along the southwest border tumbled to their lowest level in at least a decade. Agents snagged roughly 1.5 million pounds of marijuana at the border, down from a peak of nearly 4 million pounds in 2009.

The data supports the many stories about the difficulties marijuana growers in Mexico face in light of increased competition from the north. As domestic marijuana production has ramped up in places, such as California, Colorado and Washington, marijuana prices have fallen, especially at the bulk level.

"Two or three years ago, a kilogram [2.2 pounds] of marijuana was worth $60 to $90," a Mexican marijuana grower told NPR news in December 2014. "But now they're paying us $30 to $40 a kilo. It's a big difference. If the U.S. continues to legalize pot, they'll run us into the ground."

And it's not just price — Mexican growers are facing pressure on quality, too. "The quality of marijuana produced in Mexico and the Caribbean is thought to be inferior to the marijuana produced domestically in the United States, or in Canada," the DEA wrote last year in its 2015 National Drug Threat Assessment. "Law enforcement reporting indicates that Mexican cartels are attempting to produce higher-quality marijuana to keep up with US demand."

If the decline in border seizures is any indication, however, it appears that Mexican growers are having difficulty competing with domestic production. Some federal authorities are beginning to believe this is the case. Noting the decline in border seizures, Michael Botticelli, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, told a Senate committee last year that "given the increase in marijuana use among the American population, this suggests that people using marijuana in the United States may be increasingly obtaining marijuana from domestic sources."

Read the rest at The Washington Post

Related: Federal Agents Seizing Far Less Marijuana at the Southern Border (The Weed Blog)

Related: Three Major Concepts That Shatter the Myths Surrounding Drug Legalization (The Influence)

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