The tendency in Brazil is for marijuana use to decline. Marijuana is the most widely consumed drug in the world among the 200 million individuals between the ages of 15 and 64 who use narcotics at least once a year, as well as among the 100 million who take drugs once a month.
These data are from this year’s edition of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime’s (UNODC) annual World Drug Report, which was released yesterday, June 26, in the UN Information Center in Rio de Janeiro.
The coordinator of the UNODC’s Drugs and HIV/AIDS Projects for Brazil and the Southern Cone, Cíntia Freitas, said that the decrease may be credited to the government’s anti-drug campaigns and greater control and inspection of marijuana traffic.
She points out that Brazil ranks sixth in the world in drug seizures and is responsible for 3% of the global total. Brazilian officials seized 200 tons of the drug in 2002 and around 155 tons in 2004.
According to data from 2001, 1% of the Brazilian population between the ages of 12 and 64 consumes marijuana at least once a year. Studies conducted by the government in schools indicate a decline in marijuana use.
The index among youth in the 10-18 age bracket fell to 6.4% in 2004, after an upswing that began in 1989 and peaked at 7.6% in 1997.
ABr