Coffeehouse (Cannabis coffee shops)

A place where coffee or soft drugs are sold and consumed.

Netherlands and Canadian Coffee Shops

Some coffee shops, especially in the Netherlands, are places where the sale of cannabis for personal consumption by the public is tolerated by the local authorities. An establishment advertising itself as a coffeeshop (as opposed to a café) in the Netherlands is likely to be primarily in the business of selling cannabis products and possibly other substances which are tolerated under the drug policy of the Netherlands.

In the Netherlands, the selling of cannabis is tolerated (NL: gedoogd) by officials, so the law is not enforced in establishments following these nationwide general rules:

• no advertising
• no hard drug sales on the premises
• no sales to minors
• no sales transactions exceeding a quantity threshold
• no public disturbances

With the exception of advertising and alcohol, these restrictions are monitored and controlled very fiercely. An owner can have his business closed for three months for some offences, closed outright for others. There is a further on-going contradiction, as a coffeshop is allowed to sell, but not to buy, cannabis (The frontdoor is open, but the backdoor is illegal). There is as of January, 2006 proposed legislation to remedy this.

At least two coffeehouses (as of 2001) are also licensed for liquor, with the notion that the sale of cannabis is to happen at a different counter (though it may be smoked at the bar). Most coffeehouses advertise, and the constraint is more modulating that outright prohibitive. In a charming gesture of discretion still technically required, many coffeehouses keep the cannabis menu below the counter, even when the cannabis itself is in more-or-less plain view. Dutch coffee shops often fly red-yellow-green Ethiopian flags or other symbols of the Rastafari movement to indicate that they sell cannabis, as a consequence of the official ban on direct advertising. This aesthetic attracted many public artists who get commissions to create murals in the coffee shops and use the Rastafari and reggae related imagery to provoke public discussion about racial and multicultural issues.

Any shop selling soft drugs to minors or selling hard drugs at all is immediately closed. These institutions provide non-contaminated (and hence relatively safe) cannabis products, which may not be true of dealers acting illegally. Cannabis and any food products containing cannabis are generally clearly identified to prevent accidental consumption.

In the Netherlands, a koffiehuis resembles more so a coffee shop in the U.S., whilst a café is the equivalent of a bar.

Each municipalitiy has a coffee shop policy. For some this is a zero policy, i.e., they do not allow any. Most of such municipalities are either controlled by strict Protestant parties, or are bordering Belgium and Germany and simply do not wish to receive drug tourism from those countries. A March 19, 2005 article in the Observer noted that the number of Dutch cannabis coffeehouses had dropped from 1,500 to 750 over the previous five years, largely due to pressure from the conservative coalition government. The no-growth policies of many Dutch cities affect new licensing. This policy slowly reduces the number of coffeeshops, since no one can open a new one after a closure.

In nearby Denmark it seems that the coffee shops in the Freetown Christiania will be abolished in 2005 or 2006, as part of the wider issues involved with Free Christiania.

Despite Canadian laws forbiding its non-medical use, some cities and local law enforcement have, at times, tolerated coffee shops which encourage customers to smoke cannabis. In Vancouver, for example, the New Amsterdam and Blunt Brothers were cafes on West Hastings Street with such pro-cannabis policies in the late 1990s and early 2000s.

Copyrights

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from the Coffeehouse.