Evaluating Germany’s Cannabis Legalization Law
Germany remains the largest country, as measured by population size, to ever adopt a national adult-use cannabis legalization measure. Given Germany’s position as a continental and global political and economic leader, it is easy to make an argument that German legalization is the most significant cannabis policy modernization effort of its kind in history.
While there are various ongoing evaluations of Germany’s CanG law, the Evaluation of the Consumer Cannabis Act (EKOCAN) is a very prominent one that domestic lawmakers are following as they continue to consider potential updates to German cannabis public policy.
The project manager for the EKOCAN research effort is Dr. Jakob Manthey, and according to the Federal Ministry of Health’s website, the goals of the evaluation project are threefold. They include “investigating the impact of the Cannabis Act on”:
- Child and youth protection
- General health protection
- Cannabis-related crime
“To this end, a wide variety of data will be compiled (e.g., from ongoing studies on the topic or from public administration), our own surveys will be conducted (e.g., with public organizations directly involved in the topic, as well as consumers and cultivation associations), and the data will finally be evaluated with regard to the aforementioned overarching objectives.” states the Federal Ministry of Health (BMG) on its website (translated from German to English).
“The evaluation will make an important contribution to answering the question of how the law is being implemented in everyday life and whether the intended effects of the law are being achieved. Furthermore, the evaluation should provide reliable evidence for potentially necessary legislative adjustments.” BMG also states.
With that in mind, the initial findings of the EKOCAN project have surfaced via original reporting by krautinvest. I encourage everyone to read krautinvest’s article, which is very informative and insightful.
One of the major takeaways from the initial findings is that reported cannabis consumption rates were already on the rise in Germany leading up to the enactment of the CanG law, and Dr. Manthy determined that the rise was due to older individuals reporting cannabis use.
Regarding younger consumers, which is a demographic often focused on by cannabis opponents in their talking points, Dr. Manthy “sees no anomalies since the Cannabis Act came into force,” according to krautinvest’s reporting, and that Dr. Manthy doesn’t assume “that any changes can be attributed to the Cannabis Act.”
Other high-level takeaways from the initial evaluation findings are that there aren’t enough cannabis cultivation associations in Germany, that there are no “short-term changes” regarding public roadway safety, legalization has not increased reported mental illnesses, and that the CanG law has significantly lowered cannabis-related criminal offenses in Germany.