Recreational cannabis commerce is not a new thing in the Netherlands. However, expressly legal recreational cannabis commerce is. Historically, adult-use cannabis commerce was tolerated in the Netherlands, but not necessarily outright legal. That changed in recent years, albeit in a limited fashion, when lawmakers and regulators started to permit research-based recreational cannabis sales and purchases.

The ‘Closed Coffeeshop Chain Experiment’ is underway in ten jurisdictions: Almere, Arnhem, Breda, Groningen, Heerlen, Hellevoetsluis, Maastricht, Nijmegen, Tilburg, and Zaanstad. Amsterdam is notably missing from the research effort. Members of the Netherlands Parliament previously denied a proposal to expand the project to the Amsterdam-Oost district. The first official assessment of the Closed Coffeeshop Chain Experiment was recently published.

“In ten intervention municipalities, coffeeshops sell cannabis exclusively from licensed growers, whereas in ten comparison municipalities, the existing tolerance policy applies. The purpose of the follow-up measurement is to map developments since the baseline measurement and to determine whether differences are emerging between intervention and comparison municipalities.” researchers wrote (translated from Dutch to English).

Major findings from the assessment were that cannabis consumption rates have remained stable in jurisdictions where legal cannabis sales are permitted and that there are no major related public health issues in participating jurisdictions compared to the ‘comparison municipalities.’ The unregulated market still exists in participating jurisdictions, but that is not unexpected given the limited nature of the legal cannabis commerce experiment.

Below is insightful information about cannabis pricing at participating cannabis outlets in the Netherlands via a recent newsletter from cannabis industry data company Cannamonitor:

• Shops offer 78 unique products on average
• Cannabis flower prices average €10.1 per gram (and are dropping)
• Hash prices average €21.1 per gram (and are increasing)

Regional cannabis commerce pilot trials are also operating in several jurisdictions in Switzerland and are succeeding by every meaningful measure. The SCRIPT pilot trial, which operates in the Swiss cities of Bern, Biel, and Lucerne, launched sales in the spring of 2024.

An interim assessment of that cannabis pilot trial was presented earlier this month, with researchers finding that “regulated access to cannabis does not lead to increased consumption – on the contrary, there are even slight downward trends.” The assessment also determined that “regulated distribution also opens up opportunities for harm reduction by advising users on lower-risk methods of consumption, such as vaporizing or oral ingestion.”

“The study provided evidence that regulated distribution through pharmacies can encourage a switch to potentially lower-risk methods of consumption,” explained study leader Reto Auer from the Bern Institute of Primary Health Care at the University of Bern (translated from German to English).

“Furthermore, 71 percent of the study participants stated that they would pass on the risk-minimization information they received at the study pharmacies to their social circles.” the researchers wrote in a press release.

Positive results have also been found in other Swiss jurisdictions where cannabis pilot trials are operating.