Diversion of cannabis grown legally at commercial grows in Canada, where supply has long outstripped demand, to illicit markets overseas has skyrocketed recently, authorities claimed in a recent report.
However, cannabis advocates are disputing the claims published Thursday in The Telegraph, which blamed Canada’s landmark 2018 adult-use cannabis legalization law, alleging in return that there’s no evidence the illegal marijuana comes from licensed farms.
For years, Canadian licensed producers have struggled to find a market for millions of pounds of unsold cannabis flower, resorting at times to destroying it when buyers in emerging markets such as Germany cannot be found. Legal Canadian cannabis companies say that European markets are an increasingly attractive destination for their products.
However, according to Canadian law enforcement, there is more cannabis than ever before leaving the country through illicit channels. And, they alleged, a chief cause is plummeting prices in the legal domestic market.
Is cannabis diversion a global problem?
Canadian border police seized 46 tons of cannabis intended for Europe over the past 16 months, a threefold increase, officials told The Telegraph.
In Belgium, where goods of all kinds pass through a major port, authorities are now seizing more cannabis than they do cocaine.
Kristian Vanderwaeren, Belgium’s top customs official, told The Telegraph his agency seized 32 tons of cannabis in 2025, 21 tons of which came from Canada.
However, as StratCann observed, there’s no evidence linking the spike in illegal exports to any specific licensed producers. And it’s not yet clear whether the marked increase in criminal activity loosely tied to Canadian legal market realities will result in any material changes for legal producers.
Will treaty obligations thwart adult-use cannabis legalization?
Similar allegations of interstate diversion have long dogged legal markets in the United States, where authorities in several states have claimed that organized crime is using the cover of state licenses to grow massive amounts of cannabis destined for the illicit market.
The U.S.’s ability to abide by diversion controls laid out in decades-old drug-control treaties emerged as a chief concern during recent U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration hearings on marijuana rescheduling.
Canada is also in violation of these treaties, international law experts have said, but without any apparent direct consequences.
