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Illicit Drugs
Cannabis
Overview of Criminal Activity
Marihuana, hashish and liquid hashish are cannabis products, each with varying degrees of consumer popularity in Canada. However, marihuana usage is much more widespread in all regions of Canada, while hashish and liquid hashish is less popular with a more narrow consumer base that is mainly restricted to Eastern Canada. Consequently, this year’s report will only concentrate on marihuana.
“The fact of the matter is that B.C.’s marihuana grow industry is not really about marihuana at all, it is about cocaine and the funding source for other types of crime. Police intelligence indicates that the marihuana trade is directly responsible for cocaine trafficking, use and related violent crime.” RCMP Assistant Commissioner |
The Canadian marihuana market is supplied predominantly by domestically cultivated products that is supplemented to some degree by quantities of marihuana smuggled into Canada from foreign sources such as the Caribbean and Mexico. It is unclear precisely the quantity of marihuana grown in Canada but law enforcement is continually dismantling grow operations of all sizes in every region of Canada. Initially in the middle 1990s, marihuana grow operations were concentrated mainly in British Columbia but these operations gradually spread eastward through the prairie provinces to Ontario, Quebec and into Atlantic Canada.
The average marihuana grow operation will contain hundreds of plants; however, some operations may involve plants in the thousands. In one instance, a grow operation including 30,000 plants was discovered within a vacant industrial building near Barrie, Ontario.
It appears that the HELLS ANGELS and a number of Vietnamese crime groups are the predominant players in the Canadian marihuana grow operation industry. However, Italian organized crime groups have been encountered as well as many semi-independent cultivators and smaller-scale operators.While a significant quantity of the marihuana cultivated in Canada is actually destined for the United States’ market, this Canadian contribution actually represents a small portion of the total U.S. illicit consumption, as Mexico is currently their largest foreign supplier.
