If one wants to see a classic real-life example of George Orwell's 1984, all one needs to do is look at China. A country with a rich tradition and culture, one of the oldest civilizations in the world, saw its people free themselves from the ruling elites of the past and place themselves firmly in the hands of the ruling elites of the present. The country is called the People's Republic of China but there are no people in the scheme of things other than as fodder for the current ruling elites - the Communist Party of China. With the communist revolution under Mao Zedong, the elites morphed themselves from the kings of the past into the kings of the present. The people who fought and gave their lives for the revolution thought that they were wresting power from the elites only to discover that the elites had just morphed themselves into a political party that promised to give power to the people but instead seized it and put the people under even greater oppression. The leader, like Big Brother, in Orwell's 1984 is omnipresent. The party is everything and all pervasive in China. Using methods similar to Orwell's 1984, such as propaganda, deceit, violence and oppression through the various ministries of the government - much like the Ministry of Love and the Ministry of Truth - the ruling party has effectively rendered all opposition to it non-existent. From an early age, children are indoctrinated into the ideologies of the party so that they grow up into automatons without a semblance of free thinking. Those showing even the slightest dissent to the party's methods and ideologies are severely dealt with before they grow into a bigger problem. The Communist Party is a tightly enmeshed amalgamation of the king-priest-businessman hierarchy that is the basis of all class and caste-based systems in the world. The kings are the political leaders, the priests are the spokespersons for the party and the media for the religion of Communism, and the businessmen are the industries that work closely with the party to strengthen the position of the ruling elites even as they jointly control and drive the vast majority of the people who form the working classes. The outcasts in Chinese society are the free thinkers who have been labelled as traitors and threats to national security and those who exist outside the pall of the Communist Party, being too poor or sick to be incorporated into the working classes. China's vast network of surveillance and informers ensures that any dissent is treated in the same manner as the protagonist in Orwell's 1984. China's authorities get down to the level of governance that decides whether people should have children or not. The policies, in this matter, vary depending on whether it is to increase the population of the Chinese elites and working classes or to decrease the population of the minorities like the Uighurs and Tibetans, thus keeping the power structure stable.
China is like a vast hollow shell with hardly anything inside it other than the immense concentration of power with the ruling elites and masses of servile citizens that work tirelessly and mindlessly at the bidding of the elites. The shell is constantly trying to expand and engulf as much of the surrounding world as it can so as to further increase its power, while the people are just a step away from being reduced to nothing. In a world that measures success in terms of the circumference of such shells, China stands at the top of many rankings including metrics such as GDP, military power and economic clout. These are trumpeted to the people of China and to the wider world as proof of the supremacy of the Chinese nation. This is the case of much of nations that are ruled by the Communist ideal, such as Russia and North Korea, where the people are told that they are equals and must work tirelessly for the greater good when, in fact, they are only working unquestioningly for the greater wealth and power of the ruling elites comprising of the king-priest-businessman hierarchy, and quite often the greater wealth and power of one individual, the Supreme Leader or Big Brother.
China has pumped in vast resources into building its physical infrastructure, military and industrial clout. What most people fail to realize is that all this growth is founded on petrochemicals, synthetic pharmaceuticals, the arms industry, fossil-fuel based construction, chemical pesticides and fertilizers and, generally, everything synthetic that has brought the world to the brink of human-induced climate disaster. China basically manufactures all the synthetic junk at scales that most other nations have been wise enough to not venture into. In human history, we see that some of the worst crimes against the world outside are wrought by entities trying to exhibit their masculinity to the people at home and justify why they are being oppressed like they are. When the ruling elites of a nation as big as China tries to fool its vast populations that they abuse the people for their own good and so the people must submit themselves most obediently to further abuse, the repercussions are felt worldwide. The Chinese elites complete disregard for the natural world and the place of humans in it, in order to further their own delusional short-term interests, has meant that China is the world's biggest emitter of carbon dioxide through fossil fuels today, leading the US and India, two other countries with similar modes of functioning. The single-minded focus on strengthening the industries that destroy the earth has meant that China is reeling under vast debt even as it tries to lure in unsuspecting nations into its unsustainable model of economic growth. Many nations across the world, especially in Asia, Africa and South America have been fooled by the external image portrayed by China of great economic power and success and are now firmly enmeshed in the same debt traps that China itself is enmeshed in. As I said, China is a giant, brittle shell that all it takes is a tiny bit of pressure from nature to fall into pieces, collapsing inwards like a burnt-out star and dragging all those who hitched their economic growth aspirations with it into the inescapable void that surrounds all things that live in the delusion of permanence.
China, in terms of political strategy, is one of the masters of deception - deception of its own people and the people of the world. Much like the nations in Orwell's 1984, China has been practicing a game of smoke and mirrors for more than a century now. Around the time of World War II, China was said to be in friendly relations with Britain, Russia, the US and India and opposed to Germany and Japan. During the course of the 20th century, China appears to be closer to the Russia and North Korea and competitively opposed to the US, India and Britain. For the people of China, the enemy one day is soon the friend and all the propaganda against the old enemy is rewritten as propaganda against the new enemy. International tensions and conflicts are artificially created with neighbours so that the country is constantly at edge and the leader claims that all this is necessary to ensure national security. History is modified in the course of all this to reflect the latest position and the old position is erased. Amidst all this, the Chinese leader of the Communist party - Big Brother - stands tall as the savior of the people whose only aim in life is the betterment of the people. In all this subterfuge that happens, if there is one constant, it is that the Chinese leader works hand in hand with other leaders across the world that have similar interests and strategies - the leaders of the US, Britain, Russia, India and other autocratic leaders - to ensure that the industries of the elites that give wealth and power to the elite classes in all these societies are protected and prosper. The state of affairs means that the industries of the elites -petrochemicals, synthetic pharmaceuticals, the arms industry, fossil-fuel based construction, chemical pesticides and fertilizers, the medical industry, the construction industry, etc. - are always in business. The people are constantly asked to sacrifice their personal interests for the greater good of the nation. Media, education, the judiciary, the police, intelligence networks, technology, etc. are all aligned to ensure that the people are misled into thinking that there is a constant threat to their lives and nation from outside forces and their spies working within the country. Young children are indoctrinated in schools, and dissidents in prisons, to accept and appreciate the authorities and the importance of blind patriotism. The role of informant to the government is one of the key roles in society, ensuring that any dissent is quickly and brutally cracked down, as can be seen in the action taken by the state at Tianneman Square and against the Uighurs and Tibetans. China is constantly seeking to expand itself through military conflicts, economic debt traps and flooding overseas markets with its cheap products, created at great cost to the earth through the primary reliance on the fossil fuel industry. Even as the world cries out for reduction in fossil fuels to slow down global warming, China is scaling up its coal-based thermal power production so as to fuel its economic growth i.e. the wealth and power of its elites.
While ancient China was known for its rich culture, diversity and even a sense of mystique, modern China is synonymous with imitation, carefully constructed conformity, uniformity, servility to authority, and all that is plastic and synthetic. How did this slide happen for such an ancient and great nation?
China is one of the oldest surviving cultures of the world going back in history as far as we can see. Many traditions in China have survived and continue to be practiced even today. A large part of China is rural with agrarian systems supporting the Chinese economy. Yet China is the world's second largest economy today. It is the second most populous country in the world today, having recently been overtaken by India in 2023. It has one of the largest military organizations. Its cities and industries are global and boast of the latest in technology and development. It is also one of the most polluted countries in the world with serious sustainability issues. It is the largest contributor to climate change and global warming. From what I see, the advent of the British (as is the unfortunate story of many nations in the world) and the association of the Chinese with the British was one of the key starting points when China started to lose its originality. When the British arrived in China in the 18th century, they brought along with them the opium that they had got habituated to. They converted the people of China, who were traditionally cannabis users, into the opium culture. In a short span of time, vast sections of Chinese society were addicted to opium and began cultivating it on large scales mainly for the British to carry back home to Europe since European conditions and political scenarios meant that there was little scope for Britain to cultivate closer to home the amount of opium that was required to meet its addiction. Over time, the Chinese people got so addicted to opium themselves and also saw the vast profits that Britain was reaping from Chinese opium that they decided to take control over the opium themselves. But the centuries of association with Britain and opium had weakened the Chinese nation by the beginning of the 20th century. Herman Hesse wrote, in 1921 around the end of World War 1, in his book If the War Goes On and the chapter Thoughts on China, 'The eyes of the world are fixed in eager expectation upon a congress now being held in Washington for the purpose of preventing a war between the United States and Japan and limiting the naval armament of the great powers. Its work has been partially successful; something has been accomplished. There will not be a war between Japan and the United States in the forseeable future, and less money and labour will be squandered on battleships. The world has been less attentive to another aspect of the discussions in Washington. The great and powerful nations have achieved a certain measure of agreement. But little heed was given to a weak nation that was also present. I am speaking of China. The oldest world power in existence, vast and ancient China, has not chosen the path of adaptation to the Western world that Japan has been following consistently for several decades. China has become very weak; it has virtually ceased to be an independent power and is looked upon by the great powers as little more than a 'sphere of influence' to be cautiously divided among them.' He says in another place in the same chapter 'Years ago a Chinese devotee of his country's old and venerable ideas spoke of these developments in terms that have no bearing on politics but are close to the spirit of the Tao Te Ching. He spoke roughly as follows: Let the Japanese or other nations conquer us, take possession of our country, and run our government. Let them! It will be seen that we are weaker, that we can be conquered and gobbled up. Let that happen, if that is China's destiny! But when the others have gobbled us up, it remains to be seen whether they will be able to digest us. It may well turn out that our government and army, administration and finances will be Japanese, American, and English but that the conquerors will be powerless to change China, that on the contrary they will be conquered and changed by the spirit of China. For China is weak in the art of war and in political organization but rich in life, rich in spirit, rich in ancient culture.' Today, if the devotee of the old and venerable ideas of China were to write, he would have to say the exact opposite of what he said then, completely opposed to the spirit of the Tao Te Ching. Today, China is strong in the art of war and political organization but weak in life, weak in spirit and has forgotten its ancient culture in a race to imitate the west and be like it, committing all the mistakes that the west did and on even greater scales. Hesse further writes 'I remembered the amiable Chinese when I read the latest reports from Washington. And I thought: even now, while China though not yet conquered is consummating its decline as a world power, it has conquered a large part of the West! In the last twenty years the ancient Chinese culture, previously known only to the merest handful of scholars, has begin to conquer us through translations of its ancient books, through the influence of its ancient thinking. In the last ten years Lao-tzu has become known through translations into any number of languages and achieved enormous influence throughout Europe. Formerly, until twenty years ago, when we spoke of the 'culture of the East', we thought exclusively of India, of the Vedas, Buddha, and the Bhagavad-Gita. Now, when we speak of East asian culture, we think equally or perhaps still more of China, of Chinese art, of Lao-tzu, of Chung-tzu, or Li Po. And it turns out that for us Europeans the thinking of ancient China, especially that of early Taoism, far from being a mere exotic curiosity, provides significant corroboration of our own thinking, and invaluable counsel and help. Not that from these ancient books of wisdom we can suddenly gain a new and redeeming way of life; not that we ought to cast away our Western culture and become Chinese! But in the ancient Chinese, and especially in Lao-tzu, we find reminders of a mode of thought that we have neglected, a recognition and cultivation of energies that we, busy with other things, have too long disregarded. I go to the Chinese corner of my library - a peaceful, happy corner! What wisdom there is in these ancient books and how amazingly timely it can be! How often during the terrible war years they have yielded up thoughts that consoled and revived my spirits!' Hesse says, 'Picking up a notebook in which I have jotted down quotations, I read a message from Yang Chu. A man's attitude towards life, says this Chinese philosopher, possibly a contemporary of Lao-tzu and earlier than the Buddha, should be that of a master towards his servant. Then follows the Maxim of the Four Dependencies: Most men are dependent on four things which they desire too greatly: long life; fame; title and rank; money and possessions. It is their unremitting desire for these four things that makes men fear demons and fear one another, that makes them fear the mighty and fear punishment. Every state is built upon this four-fold fear and dependency. Men who are prey to these four dependencies live like madmen. They may be slain or they may be permitted to live; in either case destiny comes to these men from without. That man, however, who loves his destiny and knows himself to be one with it - cares nothing for long life, for fame, for rank or wealth! Such men carry peace within them. Nothing in the world can threaten them, nothing can be hostile to them. They bear their destiny within their own selves!' Compare the China that Hesse speaks about with the China of today, ruled by a set of autocratic elites who have subjugated the majority of the people into toiling for them in the petrochemicals, synthetic pharmaceuticals, fossil-fuel based construction, opium, non-biodegradable plastic, chemical pesticides and fertilizers, medical, arms, black market for illegal drugs, cybercrime cartels, surveillance, media, army, police, judiciary, education and other industries, without freedoms, without ganja and charas, brainwashed to believe that nothing but the party exists. The ancient Chinese wisdom - 'the grand style' as Nietzsche puts it in The Will to Power - had something that is missing today, and that is ganja and charas, the spiritual herb of the sages.
The oldest known evidence of cannabis usage, dating back 10,000 years, was discovered a burial site in Taiwan, an island off China that it lays claim to. Marijuana Moment reported in 2020 that 'Shen Nung, a Chinese emperor around 2,700 BCE who is also considered the father of Chinese medicine, reportedly regarded marijuana as a “first-class herb” that was not dangerous.' In Tibet, that was annexed by China in the 1950s, Marijuana Moment reports that 'Marijuana was considered a “holy plant” in Tibet and was used in Tantric Buddhism to “facilitate meditations.”' Live Science says 'From China, coastal farmers brought pot to Korea about 2000 B.C. or earlier, according to the book "The Archeology of Korea" (Cambridge University Press, 1993). Cannabis came to the South Asian subcontinent between 2000 B.C. and 1000 B.C., when the region was invaded by the Aryans — a group that spoke an archaic Indo-European language. The drug became widely used in India, where it was celebrated as one of "five kingdoms of herbs ... which release us from anxiety" in one of the ancient Sanskrit Vedic poems whose name translate into "Science of Charms."' I do not agree with the theory that the Aryans brought cannabis into India between 2000 B.C. and 1000 B.C. The indigenous communities of India were likely to have used cannabis much before that. Areas of wild cannabis growth cover the Himalayan tracts. The plant is 29 million years old and would have surely grown in the Himalayas well before the Aryans are said to have brought it. Another fact, that I consider as evidence that cannabis was in India before the Aryans is the fact that when they imposed their caste system on the indigenous communities, they reduced these communities to the lowest castes, or Shudras, or as outcasts when they could not fit them into their hierarchical caste system. One of the biggest differentiators between the upper castes - king-priest-businessman - and the lower caste working classes and the outcasts was that these lowest castes and outcasts smoked ganja and charas. To differentiate themselves, the ruling elite upper castes drank cannabis as bhang, mainly to avoid detection for association with the cannabis plant, specifically ganja and charas, even though bhang contains both these forms of cannabis in crushed form. Other scientific findings themselves contradict the theory of Aryan introduction of cannabis in Asia between 2000 B.C. and 1000 B.C., as can be seen from the articles cited at the start of this paragraph. If one needs to date when cannabis came to India, then dating the period when Siva last walked the earth might be a good starting point.
The 1925 International Opium Conference was quite appropriately the place where the decision was taken that cannabis must be criminalized globally. This was the culmination of decades of anti-cannabis propaganda that stated that cannabis was more harmful than opium. After successfully prohibiting cannabis in Burma (today's Myanmar) around the 1850s so that the channel of opium flow between China and Britain was hurdle-free, the British turned their attention to the biggest cannabis using nation in the world, India. British medical experts like Surgeon-Lieutenant-Colonel Crombie used erroneous data from the Dacca Asylum to show that cannabis caused insanity and argued forcefully in favor of opium and against cannabis at the Opium Conference in the 1880s. At the time that the Indian Hemp Commission was conducting its work in 19th century India, Burma (today's Myanmar) was the only place where cannabis insanity had been stated as the justification for cannabis prohibition, based on the statistics from the Dacca Asylum. These statistics were produced and quoted by the asylum superintendent, Surgeon-Lieutenant-Colonel Crombie, in numerous instances, including before the Opium Commission, to emphasize that cannabis was most deleterious. Burma (now Myanmar) was, and still is, a vital conduit for opium trade between China and Britain, and that there were more than a few Chinese and British who viewed cannabis as a threat. The Commission states that 'Although these [lunatic asylum] statistics have been discussed seriously from year to year, they have not been much used as the basis of measures of ganja administration except in the case of Burma. In this case the Commission found that the measures taken in Burma were ostensibly based on the lunatic asylum returns which were quoted by more than one Chief Commissioner, special reference being made to the figures for the Dacca Asylum. This special reference to this asylum and the fact that it is situated in the most important ganja-consuming tract in India were among the reasons why the Commission summoned Surgeon-Lieutenant-Colonel Crombie (Bengal witness No. 104) as a witness; for he had been seven years Superintendent of that asylum. Before the Opium Commission also, and in an interesting discussion on opium published as a Supplement to the Indian Medical Gazette of July 1892, Dr. Crombie had incidentally spoken strongly of the evil effects of hemp drugs as seen in his asylum experience. The Commission hoped therefore that Dr. Crombie might be found to have devoted special attention to his asylum work, and to be able to speak with exceptional authority. He informed the Commission in his written evidence that "nearly thirty per cent. of the inmates of lunatic asylums in Bengal are persons who have been ganja smokers, and in a very large proportion of these I believe ganja to be the actual and immediate cause of their insanity." On oral examination by the Commission of Dr. Crombie, who used the Dacca asylum statistics to justify cannabis as a cause for insanity, it was found that 9 of the 14 cases attributed to cannabis insanity were inaccurate, and the remaining 5 appeared doubtful. Even if one considered the 5 cases, it only constituted 9% of the total cases and not the 30% that Dr. Crombie stated in his written evidence to the Commission.' In India, British administrative officials were particularly keen on promoting opium over ganja, mainly due to the vastly increased revenue that opium sales would bring as against the ganja, used by the poorest sections of society, which grew everywhere in India. The evidence of Babu Gobind Chandra Das, Baidya, Deputy Magistrate and Deputy Collector, Malda, to the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission of 1894-95 states that "Mr. Grant, Collector of Balasore, observes (see Bengal Excise Administration Report for 188384):— "I can only regard this rapid increase in the use of ganja as altogether lamentable. It is the only exciseable article in favour of which nothing can be said. It seems to have absolutely no virtue, and to do harm the very first time it is used. In shorter time than any other intoxicant, it establishes a craving habit, and is more irresistible than that created by any other. I cannot believe that the dearness of opium has done much to increase the consumption of ganja, and most unfortunately the price of ganja, which was very cheap before, has fallen during the year. I said last year that I thought it regretable that the price of opium has been raised. I can only repeat my opinions; at all events as far as Orissa is concerned, the measure is a bad one as regards the morality of the districts and as regards the revenue. For the past two years the local consumption of opium (a dear drug yielding a high revenue, a medical drug, hurtful only if abused) has greatly decreased, and its place has been supplied by a cheap drug that has nothing but the most seriously bad result from any use of it at all. Under ordinary circumstances, it is desirable to discourage the use of ganja by making its price as high as it can safely be made; but, under the circumstances of Orissa, it seems to me to be very unwise to do what amounts to forcing people to the extended use of most pernicious and cheap and accessible drug by putting what becomes a prohibitive price on the use of a very dear, comparatively harmless and often useful drug. If the thing is possible, I would reduce the price of opium in Orissa to what it was in 1879-80, and I would also raise the duty on ganja from R4 to R5." Though there would be few to agree with Mr. Grant for lowering the price of opium, I think everyone would endorse his views on the effects of ganja-smoking. In fact, in the next line we find. "The Commissioner agrees with Mr. Grant in his condemnation of ganja, and is in favour of the duty being raised." In the preceding year Mr. Grant had delivered himself as follows on the subject:— "I am afraid that this (increase in the consumption of ganja and decrease in that of opium) is something very like an unmixed evil. It means that people are substituting ganja,— a cheaper and infinitely more mischievous and deleterious drug. Instead of consuming maunds 3—11 of comparatively harmless opium the people consumed maunds 3—27—11 and 1/2 of ganja, which is, beyond all comparison, the drug which has least to be said in its favour and most to be against it. I strongly advocate a return to the old rate for opium, not because the new rate has so materially decreased the revenue, but because it is fast driving the people of Balasore to that resort to ganja which we know to be the root of the evils in the Uriya character." Extreme views on a subject of this kind should no doubt be accepted with caution. But when we find that there has, for a long series of years, always been a consensus of opinion amongst persons who had the best opportunities to study the question, I think that opinion cannot be thrown aside easily. Elsewhere I have quoted from several published reports of Government how Government, the Board, and the subordinate officials have always spoken against ganja, and how they considered that it would be a blessing for the people if they were to substitute alcohol for ganja. Here I shall content myself with two or three more quotations in support of my views, Let us see what His Honour the LieutenantGovernor says so long ago as 1874. Reviewing the excise administration of 1873-74, His Honour says as follows (vide page 3 of the resolution appended to the report):— "The Member in charge does not think that the time has yet arrived for any further increase of the duty. It appears, however, to the LieutenantGovernor that, of all excisable articles, the imposition of an almost prohibitive duty on ganja admits of the best justification upon both moral and economical grounds. It is generally agreed that even the moderate consumption of ganja is deleterious, and that its use leads to crime, to insanity, and other dreadful consequences. The conditions of its production are such that surreptitious cultivation appears scarcely to be possible. The cultivation of the ganja plant is not, like that of the poppy, spread over an extensive area. The whole of Bengal is supplied with ganja from a tract not exceeding 800 acres in Rajshahi. Supervision is consequently easy, and the imposition of a higher duty, if it resulted in a loss of revenue, would do so only by diminishing consumption. For the sake of the people, the Lieutenant-Governor earnestly commends this subject to the consideration of the Board." Let us now see what the Bengal Excise Commission says on this subject— "It is to be regretted, however, that this is due to some extent to the use of the pernicious drug ganja in these tracts." Let us again see what the Government of India says— "Ganja is a drug which is far more injurious in its effects than spirit or any other drug commonly consumed."—(Despatch to the Secretary of State, No. 29 of 1890, dated Calcutta, the 4th February 1890.)' This is despite noted physicians in the 19th century warning against the evils of opium and the safety of cannabis. William O'Shaugnessy, the noted 19th century British physician said "As to the evil sequelæ [with regard to hemp drugs] so unanimously dwelt on by all writers, these did not appear to us so numerous, so immediate, or so formidable as many which may be clearly traced to over-indulgence in other powerful stimulants or narcotics, viz., alcohol, opium, or tobacco."
Even today, Chinese authorities devise all kinds of surreptitious arguments to state that cannabis is as harmful, if not more, than the deadly heroin that has killed millions since its synthesis, besides relegating possibly 50 times that number to lifelong addiction and suffering. This can be seen especially in Hong Kong, a place that the Chinese authorities have struggled to assimilate into their concept of a brainwashed nation due to Hong Kong's democratic and liberal outlook. The Standard in Hong Kong reports the head of Hong Kong's drug control as stating 'Law said there was a misconception that cannabis is harmless as it is a herb. "Drugs such as heroin and cocaine are also derived from herbs, so such a saying is misleading. Therefore, the SAR government will not legalize the use of cannabis."' One can see the ridiculous nature of this argument. Cocaine and heroin are synthetic products of the natural plants opium and coca that become extremely potent and dangerous due to the synthesis and purification process. The opium and coca plants, in their natural form, have been used for thousands of years by indigenous communities for intoxication and medicine, just like cannabis. It is the elites of the world who have created heroin and cocaine for their own use and in the process prohibited the natural plants that were used traditionally by the poor. Cannabis is a safe natural plant with non-addictive properties that one cannot overdose on and cannot be compared to the heroin and cocaine that the elites of the world use. The anti-cannabis entities in China have taken special steps to ensure that Hong Kong in particular is the recipient of anti-cannabis propaganda since it is Hong Kong that is most likely to break the opium spell. MSN News reports 'The message of CBD is certainly spreading in Hong Kong, embraced by both the healthy (there's a CBD yoga lounge at popular studio Yoga Bam Bam) and the hedonistic (craft brewer Young Master Ales offers a range of CBD beers). Still, Mullen is hardly satisfied. "There's a large part of the population that I'm not reaching," says Mullen. While Hong Kong has a deeply ingrained culture of taking herbal remedies for health conditions and general wellness, there is mostly a stigma against anything related to cannabinoids.' The stigma around cannabis is something that the ruling elites have carefully constructed over a period of time to ensure that the opium market is kept-threat free. A classic example of this is how the authorities manipulated information to project cannabis as the cause of death of the legend Bruce Lee. The authorities did this so that the cannabis culture in Hong Kong will not grow, and in fact, so that they can use Lee's death as an excuse to clamp down on cannabis use. Alex Ben Block writes, in 1974, in The Legend of Bruce Lee, 'Hong Kong police, it's said, fear local youth might discover the pleasures of grass, and what is currently a minor problem might mushroom. They quickly grabbed the "killer drug" image of cannabis and tied it to Lee as an anti-drug message. Lee's image, of course, suffered for it.' It appears that the cannabis prohibition in China is discrimination against the white man as well. So, it cannot be said that only blacks, Indians, Chinese, Hispanics, ingenious tribes, etc. are discriminated against the world over. China is a place where the ganja smoking white man is the subject of reefer madness. Nice to see that...Ben Block further writes, 'In Hong Kong however, where there is almost no marijuana use, the drug conjures up images of harder drugs, much as "grass" used to be considered the "devil weed" in the United States before its usage spread in the late 1960s. Police in Hong Kong, even now, tend to pay more attention to hash or grass, it seems, than heroin or opium, simply because the substances are less familiar and have come to be associated with the dreaded "hippie tourist Europeans" (anyone in Hong Kong who is not Chinese, and who has white skin, is called a European, just as all Japanese and Chinese are lumped together in America with Vietnamese and others as Orientals).' It is not just law enforcement, but the entire power structure - media, physicians, government officials, etc. who propagated the myth. Ben Block writes, 'Even as Bruce was being buried in Seattle, more headlines about him were appearing in the Hong Kong press. First lab tests from the autopsy, not done until thirty-six hours after death, were just coming in, and the big sensation was again "cannabis." Eventually the fact that there were traces of cannabis, or marijuana in Lee's stomach was completely discredited as a reason for his death. A doctor later said that it had as much meaning as telling him Lee had drunk a cup of tea the day he died.' The top medical expert, brought in to shed more light on the subject, was a British physician who pointed to the synthetic pharmaceutical analgesic Equagesic brought about by a possible allergic reaction to the ingredients meprobamate or aspirin, or possibly both. The analgesic had been given to Lee by an acquaintance when he reported having a headache. Similarities here between the deaths of Jimi Hendrix and Bruce Lee. Ben Block writes, 'The top expert brought in on the case was Professor R D Teare, the professor of forensic medicine at the University of London. He ridiculed the theory that cannabis contributed to the collapse the actor suffered on May 10 or to his death on July 20. He said cannabis had been taken in various forms for centuries, and deemed it pure coincidence that shortly before the onset of Lee's collapse in May and his death he had taken cannabis. "It would be irresponsible and irrational to ascribe the causes of death to cannabis sensitivity, if over the years there had been no previous record of such a happening," the professor stated. Professor Teare said that his opinion was that the cause of death was acute cerebral edema (brain swelling) due to hypersensitvity to either meprobamate or aspirin, or possibly the combination of the two, contained in the drug Equagesic.' The physician who conducted the autopsy on Bruce Lee, Dr. R. R. Lycette, also confirmed the findings of Professor R D Teare. Ben Block writes, 'Clinical pathologist Dr. R R Lycette of Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Hong Kong testified Lee's death could not have been caused by cannabis poisoning, but was more likely due to hypersensitivity to one of the elements of Equagesic. Dr. Lycette, who performed the autopsy on Lee, explained hypersensitivity is an adverse reaction of a body to a foreign substance. "The substance which Lee could have been hypersensitive to might have been contained in Equagesic - a tablet he took - but I can't definitely say which compound in the tablet Lee was hypersensitive to," said the doctor.' But nobody from the authorities paid much heed to these reports that even reeked of possible foul play. Instead, they used the death of Bruce Lee to propagate the 'cannabis is deadly' myth, protecting the synthetic pharmaceutical Equagesic, besides aspirin and meprobamate, for the benefit of the synthetic pharmaceutical industry. Even though his death was ultimately diagnosed as an allergic reaction to the painkiller Equagesic, the authorities did not waste the opportunity to spread the message among the public that it was cannabis that had killed him, despite medical experts clearly stating that cannabis was as lethal as a cup of tea.
The model of Britain outsourcing opium production to China was replicated in other areas such as the production of western pharmaceuticals that replaced traditional Chinese medicine and, with the advent of the fossil fuel industry, the production of a vast array of fossil-fuel based products that spawned the non-biodegradable plastic industry, the chemical pesticide and fertilizer industry, the synthetic fabric industry and the construction industry based on the byproducts of the coal-based thermal power stations. Since labour and resources were cheap in China, the elites were able to mobilize vast resources to create products that could be exported to foreign markets. Even as the natural world and the vast population of the working classes, the poor and the indigenous communities in China suffered, the Chinese elites of the king-priest-businessman who together worked under the cloak of the Communist Party became more rich and powerful and tightened their grip on the lower classes and the poor. Western nations who vastly benefited from using China as their outsourcing destination provided the arms and technology needed to protect these industries from threats, especially from the people of China. The people were made to believe that the threats were from outside nations envious of China's economic growth and so they gladly enrolled themselves into the huge armies that protected these industries besides toiling in the very same industries to make the elites wealthy. In exchange for their time and effort, the vast majority of the Chinese people were given a lifestyle that mimicked the Western nations - gadgets, malls, fast food, cars, housing in cities and so on - that made the Chinese people think that they had progressed greatly as a civilization.
China is one of the world's leading producers, if not the largest, of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs) that form the basis of the global synthetic pharmaceutical industry. NCBI reports that 'Most of the North American supply of aspirin, for example, comes from China, which produces about 120 billion tablets per year.' Market Watch reports that 'China is the largest supplier of Ibuprofen, with a production market share nearly 48% in 2016. India is the second largest supplier of Ibuprofen, enjoying production market share nearly 30.7% in 2016.' Outsourcing-Pharma reports that 'China is the largest supplier of paracetamol to the pharmaceutical industry due to its ability to manufacture the active pharmaceutical ingredient at a fraction of the cost of European companies. As per the following article from 2009, China and India are the largest manufacturers of paracetamol. Together they produced 70% of the global market at about 115,000 tonnes per year.'
Besides this, China is heavily dependent on its opium that fuels the legal and illegal opioid industries of the world along with Afghanistan and Mexico. Not only is Chinese opium a large slice of the global opium pie, China is also one the biggest manufacturers of fentanyl, the synthesized opioid that is many times more potent and dangerous than heroin. In recent times, due to the negative publicity that China has been receiving internationally for its opium and fentanyl businesses, it has decided to outsource these to neighbouring countries like Myanmar, Laos and Thailand. The Chinese government effectively remote controls these nations, having installed puppet governments that control the people through the arms and technology supplied by China and countries with similar interests such as India, the world's largest legal producer of opium. Chinese opium and fentanyl cater to markets in Asia and Oceania and even the insatiable US, whereas Afghan opium caters to the markets in Europe, the Middle East and Central Asia. Mexico primarily caters to the world's biggest opium market, the US, though Mexican opium traders work with Chinese traders to meet fluctuations in demand and supply in the global markets to ensure that things run smoothly for the elites. China's opium first caters to the needs of the Chinese ruling elites - most likely as heroin and morphine - and the rest is exported to elites in other countries. While China manufactures methamphetamine and fentanyl, both locally and in outsourced Asian countries, these are produced primarily for export. Opium has been very dear to the Chinese since the British got them hooked to it so they will only part with it if they have any to spare. Wikipedia says 'After his death, a notebook of poetry written by Morrison was recovered, titled Paris Journal; amongst other personal details, it contains the allegorical foretelling of a man who will be left grieving and having to abandon his belongings, due to a police investigation into a death connected to the Chinese opium trade. "Weeping, he left his pad on orders from police and furnishings hauled away, all records and mementos, and reporters calculating tears & curses for the press: 'I hope the Chinese junkies get you' and they will for the [opium] poppy rules the world".'
Marking an even more alarming drift to Chinese society's approach towards drugs, China has emerged as one of the hubs of fentanyl, methamphetamine and novel psychotropic substance (NPS) manufacture, distribution and consumption, besides the traditional opioids and opiates, in the absence of cannabis as a recreational drug. This has apparently come about through multiple home labs and backyard operations. Fentanyl, around 50 times as potent as heroin raised alarm bells in the US and Australia due to the death toll from its usage. Chinese drug cartels are said to work with Mexican and other international cartels spreading the manufacture, distribution and sale of opium derivatives like heroin and fentanyl. The United Nations Office of Drug Control (UNODC) states in its World Drug Report 2020, that 'According to United States authorities, most of the fentanyls destined for the North American market have been manufactured in China in recent years, from where they were either shipped directly to the United States, mostly through postal services, or were first shipped to Mexico and, to a lesser extent, Canada and then smuggled into the United States. However, after the introduction by China in May 2019 of drug controls based on generic legislation with regard to the fentanyls, which effectively brought more than 1,400 known fentanyl analogues under national control in China, early signs suggest that fewer fentanyls were smuggled from China to North America. At the same time, attempts to manufacture fentanyl and its analogues inside North America are increasing, notably in Mexico, by means of a method using precursor chemicals smuggled into the subregion from East Asia and South Asia.' With increased global focus on China's fentanyl production and supply, China decided to ship only the precursors to the US where the final product can be assembled. UNODC, reports that 'The clandestine manufacture of fentanyls within North America is thus not really a new phenomenon and has the potential to increase in importance following the recent control of fentanyls substances in China.' NPR reported around 2020 that 'Felbab-Brown says China's new stance on fentanyl-related substances stems partially from a desire to be a global enforcer on drugs. "From a public relations perspective, it's difficult for China to be accused of being a source of drugs," she says. China does not have a monopoly on fentanyl production, she adds. "Even if tomorrow the United States wouldn't get fentanyl from China, others would step in. Most obviously India, a major source of addictive drugs."'
China was known for its opium dens in the past, but these were banned only to lay the foundation for the more potent processed derivatives of opium to take root and spread across the world. The ban on cannabis has only served to aid the process as all these highly dangerous synthetic drugs have quickly moved in to fill the space. There has also been the appearance of synthetic cannabinoids that are particularly alarming as they mimic the appearance of natural cannabis but are deadly to use with none of cannabis's recreational or medicinal properties. Synthetic cannabis from China is said to be freely available in the streets of many of the world's cities, with young people most often falling victim to it due to the lack of availability of the safe, healthy but banned natural cannabis. Even though there are reports of Chinese crackdown on these dangerous synthetic drugs, it appears that China has merely outsourced their production and distribution to its satellite countries, namely Myanmar, People's Republic of Laos, and possibly North Korea. By installing a puppet government in Myanmar and supplying the government with the arms needed to hold the people hostage, China secured its supply by outsourcing opium cultivation to Myanmar. UNODC reports that 'The most significant trafficking activities worldwide of opiates not of Afghan origin concern opiates produced in South-East Asia (mostly Myanmar), which are trafficked to other markets in East and SouthEast Asia (mostly China and Thailand) and to Oceania (mostly Australia). Seizures made in those countries accounted for 11 per cent of the global quantities of heroin and morphine seized (excluding seizures made by Afghanistan) in 2018, down from 15 per cent in 2015. This went in parallel with reported reductions in opium production in Myanmar of 20 per cent over the period 2005–2018.' Last year, Myanmar overtook Afghanistan as the world's leading producer of illegal opium under the guardianship of China.
Novel psychotropic substances (NPS) synthesized in labs are another of China's contribution to the world. The trade of opium, methamphetamine and fentanyl explains the bond between the US and China. The trade of NPS explains the bond between India and China and the primary market for it, Russia. Being the global leader in manufacture and export of active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), China's synthetic pharmaceutical sector is well placed to churn out NPS, as is India's synthetic pharmaceutical sector that imports the bulk of its APIs from China. UNODC reports, in its World Drug Report, 2020, that 'After marked increases over the 2009-2012 period, the overall quantities of synthetic NPS seized have shown a downward trend since 2012, most notably when they fell from 44 tons in 2017 to 10 tons in 2018. This may partly reflect the fact that some of the most widely used and most harmful NPS have been put under national and international control in recent years and therefore, according to the current definition, no longer belong to the NPS category. Moreover, a number of countries in North America, Europe and Oceania, where major markets for NPS are located, have introduced various controls on NPS trade in recent years. In parallel, China, which is frequently mentioned as the main country of origin or departure for various synthetic NPS (with 27 per cent of all such mentions over the 2014–2018 period, ahead of India with 10 per cent), has introduced controls in various waves on the manufacture of and trade in such substances. This and other developments appear to have had an impact on the proliferation of NPS at the global level, reducing the quantities of those substances on key markets.'
Methamphetamine, especially, has been on the rise in China according to the UNODC World Drug Report 2020. It says, 'While China does not report data on drug treatment admissions, the majority of registered drug users (nearly 60 per cent) in 2018 comprised users of synthetic drugs (mainly methamphetamine)'. Besides outsourcing opium manufacture to Myanmar, Laos and Thailand, China also outsources methamphetamine manufacture to Indonesia and Malaysia. UNODC reports that 'The region with the next largest number of methamphetamine laboratories dismantled was Asia, accounting for 6 per cent of the global total in the period 2014–2018. Most of these facilities were dismantled in China and the Islamic Republic of Iran, which together accounted for 94 per cent of all reported laboratories dismantled in Asia, while some clandestine methamphetamine laboratories were also dismantled, in descending order of importance, in Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, India, the Republic of Korea, Myanmar and Hong Kong, China.' UNODC says that 'Quantities of methamphetamine seized in East and South-East Asia increased eightfold over the period 2009–2018, to close to 100 tons, and preliminary data for 2019 show further strong increases in the quantities of methamphetamine seized, in particular in South-East Asia, with increases reported in 2019 by, among other countries, Brunei Daraussalam, Cambodia. Hong Kong, China, Indonesia, Japan, the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore and Viet Nam. In most years in the past decade the largest quantities of methamphetamine seized in East and South-East Asia were reported by China. In 2018, by contrast, 66 per cent of all the methamphetamine seized in that subregion was seized in Thailand, followed by Indonesia (8 per cent) and Malaysia (8 per cent) and only then by China (6 per cent), reflecting underlying shifts in the methamphetamine market in South-East Asia, that is, a decline in the methamphetamine market in China in parallel with ongoing increases in the ASEAN countries.' Like fentanyl precursors for local US production, China also supplies methamphetamine precursors to Mexican drug cartels so that they can export methamphetamine to the US and South America. UNODC reports that 'The decline in the domestic supply of methamphetamine, indicated by the falling number of manufacturing facilities dismantled in the United States, going hand in hand with increasing use and an overall increase in the supply of the drug, can be explained by the increasing importance of rapidly growing illegal methamphetamine imports from clandestine manufacture sites in neighbouring Mexico. According to the United States authorities, the latter phenomenon appears to have resulted from attempts by Mexican organized crime groups to diversify their drug portfolio as they attempted to reduce their dependence on cocaine produced in countries in South America, preferring instead to source the required chemicals from China and produce methamphetamine themselves. Methamphetamine shipments intercepted along the south-western border of the United States increased almost fourfold between 2013 and 2018.' The existence of the mammoth synthetic pharmaceutical industry in China enables the easy manufacture of precursors for fentanyl and methamphetamine. UNODC reports that 'Countries identified as significant source countries for methamphetamine shipments in Asia in the period 2014–2018 included Myanmar, followed by China, Thailand, India and Iran (Islamic Republic of). Clandestine methamphetamine manufacture in Asia seems to be still largely based on the use of pseudoephedrine or ephedrine as precursors, although reports from Afghanistan suggest that ephedrine is extracted from ephedra plant material and used as a precursor for methamphetamine. The authorities in Myanmar and Thailand have reported the seizure of increasing quantities of sodium cyanide and benzyl cyanide in recent years. These substances can be used for synthesizing P-2-P, which is then used to manufacture either amphetamine or methamphetamine.' In China, where not even a leaf falls without the knowledge of the ruling party, it is quite obvious that the illegal trade of fentanyl, methamphetamine and NPS is part of the ruling elites' bouquet of China's offerings to the people of the world, and its own oppressed classes, in place of ganja and charas. These synthetics are, of course, essentially mind-altering drugs to keep the people brainwashed and, in a stupor, highly servile and dependent on the government for their addictions. UNODC reported that 'Similar to the situation in the United States, where the manufacture of methamphetamine declined while increasing in neighbouring Mexico, both China and Iran (Islamic Republic of) reported declining domestic production, reflected in the decreasing numbers of methamphetamine laboratories dismantled in recent years, going hand in hand with the expansion of methamphetamine manufacture in their neighbouring countries. Indeed, by 2018 the Islamic Republic of Iran reported that most of the methamphetamine found on its territory originated in Afghanistan and was trafficked either from there directly or via Pakistan. Similarly, China reported that methamphetamine seized in recent years has originated primarily in Myanmar. In contrast to many other countries, however, the marked declines in the domestic manufacture of methamphetamine in China appear to have more than outweighed any increase in clandestine manufacture and imports from neighbouring countries. This is revealed in the decline in methamphetamine found in the wastewater in cities across China, with wastewater-based estimates suggesting a fall in methamphetamine consumption amounts of 26 per cent over the period 2014 –2018'. UNODC reported Thailand, besides Myanmar as a key methamphetamine outsourcing destination for China. It said 'The largest quantities of methamphetamine seized in 2018 were the quantities seized in the United States, followed by Thailand and Mexico. Marked increases in the quantities seized from 2017 to 2018 were reported by the United States and Thailand, while the quantities of methamphetamine seized in China declined, in line with reports of wastewater analysis that showed a significant decline in methamphetamine consumption in that country.' Thailand too has an autocratic government that has legalized cannabis just enough so that the elites can access it while the rest of the country works to meet the needs of the elites in Thailand and China. UNODC reported that 'This shift from China as the main location of methamphetamine manufacture and trafficking to other countries in East and South-East Asia is also indirectly reflected in trafficking data reported by Australia. China and Hong Kong, China, were the two main embarkation points for methamphetamine trafficked to Australia in 2015, whereas in the fiscal years 2016/17 and 2017/18 the most important embarkation points were the United States, followed by Thailand and Malaysia. In fact, in 2018, the Australian authorities reported that the importance of China as a source country for methamphetamine had declined while there has been an emerging trend in the growth of quantities of seized methamphetamine originating in South-East Asia, mainly in the Mekong region, including the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Myanmar and Thailand.' It appears that the precursors sent from China to the US make their way back as the finished product, methamphetamine, to China, showing a two-way trade relationship between the governments of these two countries. UNODC reports that 'The United States, for example, has been reported by other countries as a country of departure of methamphetamine for Oceania (Australia and New Zealand), Asia (Japan, the Philippines, Hong Kong, China and Mongolia) and Europe (Ireland).' It said 'Most of the methamphetamine available in East and South-East Asia is sourced within the subregion. The dynamics of methamphetamine manufacture and trafficking within that subregion are, however, less well understood than in others as the available indicators show partly contradictory patterns. Although in previous years, China and Myanmar were identified as the most frequently identified countries of “origin”, “departure” and “transit” in East and South-East Asia, manufacture of methamphetamine may now be more widely spread across the subregion, although it is not clear whether frequently mentioned departure countries, such as Malaysia or Thailand, are also the countries of origin or mainly transit countries for methamphetamine manufactured in Myanmar. In fact, Myanmar reported Thailand and the Lao People’s Democratic Republic as main destination countries for methamphetamine shipments in 2018, while Malaysia reported Thailand as the main departure country'. This outsourcing of methamphetamine manufacture to remotely controlled neighbouring countries has enabled China to reach a much wider global market, using the access that these countries have to larger parts of the world, and washing its hands clean of the whole operation so that it can loudly espouse the War on Drugs, especially ganja and charas, on the global stage. UNODC reports that 'While methamphetamine trafficking flows from East and South-East Asia to countries outside the subregion remain modest, some smuggling to destinations around the world was reported, mainly smuggling from Malaysia, Thailand and Myanmar in 2018 or, when the period is extended to the past five years, mainly from China and Thailand. Destinations outside the subregion included countries in South Asia, the Near and Middle East (Saudi Arabia as well as Israel), Oceania (Australia and New Zealand), North America (the United States as well as Canada), Western Europe (notably Switzerland as well as Italy, Germany, France, Spain and Iceland), Eastern Europe (notably the Russian Federation) and Africa (notably South Africa) over the period 2014–2018'. China and the US together meet the needs of Oceania - Australia and New Zealand - through their outsourced production.
Due to the high incidence of needle-sharing for the use of opium, fentanyl, methamphetamine and NPS, China, Pakistan and Russia have the highest rates of HIV among persons who inject drugs (PWID). UNODC, says in its World Drug Report 2020 that 'A small number of countries continue to account for a large proportion of the total global number of PWID [persons who inject drugs] living with HIV. In 2018, for example, PWID living with HIV in China, Pakistan and the Russian Federation accounted for almost half of the global total (49 per cent), while PWID in those three countries comprise only a third of all PWID worldwide.'
The US White House released a briefing in September 2021 stating that 'The United States is committed to working together with the countries of the Western Hemisphere as neighbors and partners to meet our shared challenges of drug trafficking and use. My Administration will seek to expand cooperation with key partners, such as Mexico and Colombia, to shape a collective and comprehensive response and expand efforts to address the production and trafficking of dangerous synthetic drugs that are responsible for many of our overdose deaths, particularly fentanyl, fentanyl analogues, and methamphetamine. In Mexico, we must continue to work together to intensify efforts to dismantle transnational criminal organizations and their networks, increase prosecutions of criminal leaders and facilitators, and strengthen efforts to seize illicit assets. In Bolivia, I encourage the government to take additional steps to safeguard the country’s licit coca markets from criminal exploitation and reduce illicit coca cultivation that continues to exceed legal limits under Bolivia’s domestic laws for medicinal and traditional use. In addition, the United States will look to expand cooperation with China, India, and other chemical source countries in order to disrupt the global flow of synthetic drugs and their precursor chemicals.' While China has been openly opposing global legalization of ganja and charas, the US has had Republican and Democrat governments take turns in keeping ganja and charas illegal at the federal level even as 24 US states (at the time of writing) have legalized ganja and charas for adult recreational use and the majority of the US public are in favor of federal ganja and charas legalization. In terms of the global picture, what we see are the global elites selling their synthetic legal and illegal pharmaceuticals, their cocaine, heroin, methamphetamine, and even ganja and charas (procured from the black market at prices that only the elites can afford) amongst themselves while keeping it out of the hands of the vast majority of the world's people - especially the poorest, the working classes, indigenous communities - and trying to push these sections into alcohol, tobacco, synthetic pharmaceutical medicines, methamphetamine, opioids, fentanyl, (not cocaine and heroin though, mind you, these are reserved for only the elites), basically everything else besides ganja and charas. In this sense, the global prohibition on ganja and charas is the playing out of the class and caste system where the vast majority of the world are oppressed and discriminated against by the elites. The propaganda created over the last 150 years - that ganja and charas cause insanity; that ganja and charas cause crime and only criminals use it; that ganja and charas is more harmful than alcohol, opium or tobacco; that ganja and charas have no medicinal value; that only the lowest classes and castes and the outcasts consume ganja and charas; and so on have been used to brainwash the majority of these sections of society, including those in China, into thinking that all this is true.
The people who are most affected by the prohibition of cannabis worldwide, as well as in China, are the poorest, the minorities, the indigenous communities, the elderly, the youth, the ill and women. Though authorities claim to be the party of the people, the people's medicine, cannabis, has been taken away from them and has been substituted with deadly synthetic drugs. PLOS One reports that traditional Chinese medicine contained cannabis (as hemp) and that these had vast therapeutic value. It says, 'Results: 65 primary articles (18 clinical, 47 pre-clinical) were reviewed. Several randomised controlled trials showed hempseed pills (in Traditional Chinese Medicine formulation MaZiRenWan) improving spontaneous bowel movement in functional constipation. There was also evidence suggesting benefits in cannabis dependence, epilepsy, and anxiety disorders. Pre-clinically, hemp derivatives showed potential anti-oxidative, anti-hypertensive, anti-inflammatory, anti-diabetic, anti-neuroinflammatory, anti-arthritic, anti-acne, and anti-microbial activities. Renal protective effects and estrogenic properties were also exhibited in vitro.'
China's economy is today so tightly enmeshed with the fossil fuel industry that its entire survival depends on it. The primary sources of energy that fuel economic growth are the coal-based thermal power stations on which it is vastly dependent. The fossil fuel industry provides the raw materials for China's chemical fertilizers and pesticides. The fossil fuel industry also provides raw materials for China's construction, non-biodegradable plastic and synthetic fabric industries. In effect, China's economy is so tightly bound in a death-embrace with the fossil fuel industry that for the economy to grow the world has to suffer and for the world to heal China's current fossil fuel-based industries and economy have to take a massive hit. These industries are the backbone that enable the elites in China to maintain their supremacy over the rest of the population. If the fossil-fuel dependent industries take a hit, China's current set of elites will take a massive hit.
For the global fossil fuel industry, and therefore the Chinese fossil fuel industry and allied industries the biggest threat on the horizon is complete cannabis legalization. Complete global cannabis legalization will mean large scale cultivation of cannabis in Asia, Africa and South America - the lower-class nations in the global scheme of things. Large scale cannabis cultivation globally is a direct threat to not just the fossil fuel industry, through the production of biofuels, but also the allied industries through the production of hemp-based construction, biodegradable plastic, fabrics, paper and packaging, etc. and a reduction in the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. For the opioid industry, the medical industry that depends on petrochemical-based medical equipment and the synthetic pharmaceutical industry dependent on petrochemical-based APIs, cannabis is a direct threat as it will mean a massive overall reduction in the amount of opioids and APIs that nations import from China to fuel the synthetic pharmaceutical industries.
It is no wonder then that China, or to put it more specifically the Chinese elite king-priest-businessman classes, are the world's biggest opponent to cannabis legalization. China has repeatedly and strongly opposed global cannabis legalization efforts stating that it is a threat to public health, completely turning a blind eye to the contributions that it has made to taking the world to the brink of human induced wars and climate disaster. Instead of walking the path of a sustainable and inclusive future, China has in recent times taken aggressive steps to block cannabis legalization on the global stage. From creating a pandemic hoax to promote its pharmaceutical and petrochemical industries to opposing cannabis vehemently at the UN, China's anti-cannabis action has the most vocal, making the US of the 1960s and Russia appear mild in comparison. At the UN meeting to review the rescheduling of cannabis held in March 2020, China was one of the key opponents to cannabis. According to MJBizDaily, 'China hoped “the WHO will continue to strengthen its research on the dangers and risks of abuse of cannabis.”' It along with Russia, Japan, Singapore, Nigeria, Egypt and Indonesia pushed for and welcomed the postponement of the cannabis rescheduling review to December 2020, thus extending the protection they offered to the businesses opposing cannabis. It meant that the people of China and the rest of the world - the majority of whom stand to gain from cannabis legalization for recreational use - continue to live in dependence of the poisonous products of unsustainable big businesses while authoritarian leaders live out their fantasies of immortality and the world hurtles towards a fast and painful extinction. Around 2020, two years after Canada legalized ganja and charas for recreational use, The Guardian reported that 'A statement posted on the website of the Chinese consulate in Toronto reminds citizens in its jurisdiction to avoid using marijuana to ensure their physical and mental health.' It appears that Chinese citizens are working their way around China's oppressive ganja and charas laws by taking up cannabis tourism to places where it is more freely available. Marijuana Moment reported in 2020 that 'Marijuana use in China is strictly forbidden. In fact, when Canada legalized cannabis last year, the Chinese government sternly reminded its citizens living in or visiting the country to “please avoid contact or using marijuana.” Yet, despite their nation’s strict views on marijuana, research shows that significant numbers of Chinese tourists are heading to Amsterdam to take part in its prolific cannabis culture. A new study published in the journal Current Issues in Tourism sheds light on some of the motivations for the cross-continental cannatourism.'
With the Communist revolution in China and the decades of single party rule, the country has been subjected to the policies of one political party. Unfortunately, the vision of this political party does not give as much importance to ecological sustainability and protection of indigenous knowledge as it does to economic development, retaining power and military growth. China, the land of countless traditional medicines and herbs, today also believes that one of the greatest of traditional medicines and intoxicants should be prohibited and continues to take strict steps to ensure this. Ironically, China is the world's largest producer of hemp, the cannabis variant used for industrial purposes and its main export is, or was till recently, to the US, another major country largely responsible for the worldwide prohibition of cannabis. After the US Farm Bill of 2018, China now imports hemp from the US to meet its huge industrial needs, particularly in the textile sector. China's cannabis prohibition rules go so far as telling its nationals who visit countries where cannabis is legally available that they are likely to be prosecuted on their return if they are found to have consumed it.
China, which has a long tradition with the cannabis plant, has been quietly embracing the low-THC hemp since it was legalized in 2010, while strongly opposing legalization of ganja and charas. High Times reported in 2020 that 'When thinking of the booming legal cannabis industry, the majority of analysts are following the developments in the United States, Canada and Israel. It makes sense, since these world superpowers are already bringing in billions of dollars annually on both medical and recreational pot. But there is another cannabis powerhouse quietly developing that you may not expect—China. According to a recent report from the South China Morning Post, a small number of Chinese provinces, including Heilongjiang, near the Russian border, and Yunnan to the south, now make up nearly half of the world’s legal hemp cultivation.' Hemp Industry Daily reported in October 2020 that 'No global picture of hemp is complete without China, which is believed to be the world’s top hemp producer. Thousands of years before hemp-derived CBD became a hot commodity, China was cultivating the plant for fiber and seed production. Like much of the world, China eventually banned hemp. But it didn’t take long for the country to resume its place in the hemp industry once the prohibition was lifted in 2010. The “industry has exploded and is set to grow even further,” noted a report about China released in February by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service. According to the FAS report, China produces more than half the world’s hemp supply. Chinese hemp–fiber sales were estimated at $1.2 billion in 2018, although the government does not release official cultivation, production or sales data.' New Frontier Data reported that 'Given both its size and cultural experience of centuries’ worth of cultivation of cannabis sativa for the plant’s strong fibers used to manufacture paper, fabric, and rope, it is not surprising that China is the world’s leader in hemp cultivation, processing, manufacturing, and exports. Until recently, China maintained half of the world’s total planting area for industrial hemp, along with half of the world’s cannabis-related patents. In 2017, Chinese domestic consumer sales of hemp were estimated at $1.1 billion (USD), or more than 1/3 of the global market. Already boasting such a substantial hemp-derived textile industry, the country’s growing CBD market is likewise poised to dominate as consumers become more familiar with the increasingly destigmatized product’s versatility.' New Frontier Data also reported that 'With global demand for hemp surging, China’s sector is poised for years of dramatic growth. In 2017, Chinese hemp sales totaled $1.1 billion (USD), approaching 1/3 of the $3.1 billion global market, with sales forecasted to grow to $1.5 billion (up 36%) by 2020. In 2017, textiles accounted for about 3/4 of China’s overall sales of $823 million (USD). Hemp-derived CBD accounted for Chinese sales of $53 million (USD) in 2017 but is forecasted to more than quadruple (by 4.3x, to $228 million) by 2020. Demand for CBD products in both Japan and South Korea – countries with high relative spending for wellness and cosmetics – could further catalyze demand for China’s hemp-derived CBD'. Since the US legalized hemp through the 2018 Farm Bill, the US has been exporting hemp to China, while keeping ganja and charas banned at the federal level. Marijuana Moment reports in November 2020 that 'NIHC says it plans to focus its advocacy on China and Europe as “top priority markets,” aiming to develop relationships and trade policies that will promote the sale of hemp products that are manufactured domestically. The federal government has also recognized the market potential of China for the crop, which historically has been a main source of hemp imports. A trade deal announced at the beginning of the year requires the country to import hemp from the U.S. on a larger scale over the next two years.' In October 2021, the US Department of Agriculture stated that 'While hemp has been grown in China for centuries, liberalization of production, processing, and use regulations have only come in recent years. China’s hemp regulations are opaque, incomplete, ever-changing, and vary by province. These regulations continue to change as hemp and hemp products gain more consumer awareness and popularity. However, only a few provinces regulate hemp and streamlined national guidelines do not exist. This report lays out Post’s understanding of China’s hemp product import requirements as of September 2021. Interested exporters are strongly encouraged to work with their importers for the most accurate and current requirements.' New Zealand Herald reported that 'For the farmers, the crop is green gold - hemp brings in more than 10,000 yuan (NZ$2,075) per hectare, compared to just a few thousand for more common crops like corn. It also has few natural enemies so there's little need for expensive pesticides. "That's pure profit," Jiang said. Jiang's farm is close to the Arctic Circle and one of the country's major centres for the legal crop. Authorities in the province turned a blind eye to its production before legalising and regulating it last year. Another major growing area is in Yunnan province where the plant's production has been regulated since 2003. Together, these areas account for about half of the world's legal commercial cropland under hemp cannabis cultivation, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.'
While India has set a 2070 deadline to meet its carbon emission goals, China has been moving fast to switch to the sustainable hemp for textiles, replacing the resource intensive cotton. It is in healthy competition with the US and Europe, in terms of trying to meet net zero emission goals. New Frontier Data reports that 'China’s 13th Five-Year Plan lays out the country’s intention to cultivate 3.2 million acres of fiber hemp for textiles by 2030. That move is being fueled by a desire to supplant cotton with less environmentally taxing crops, part of the country’s ambitions to beat the U.S. and the EU in achieving net-zero carbon emissions. Early support and investment from the Chinese government has put the country at the forefront of innovation in hemp fiber, and is largely responsible for the country’s 70% market share in the space. As governments, companies, and entrepreneurs compete to create and implement carbon-neutral technologies, China is likely to remain a major player in the expanding development of the global hemp industry.' Hemp Today reported in June 2021 that 'Qinggang County in China’s Heilongjiang Province expects to harvest hemp from 40,000 acres (~16,200 hectares) in 2021 as the government increases its support for development of high-tech solutions in the world’s capital of hemp textile production. The planting area for industrial hemp in Qinggang county has steadily grown from 1,500 acres (~607 hectares) in 2016 to feed a robust field-to-shelf industrial supply chain. Qinggang County officials say 6,600 acres (~2,600 hectares) of hemp were planted for research purposes alone in the county this year. Heilongjiang Province accounts for half of the world’s production of hemp fiber, and Qinggang County makes 70% of that output; all hemp yarns exported from Heilongjiang Province come from Qinggang, according to provincial officials.' Seeing this makes me think that China may have not only created the Covid fiasco to silence the dissidents in Hong Kong, but also to get a head start on Europe and the US in the race to net zero emission, even as these countries, along with India, froze the world for two years to pump in the synthetic pharmaceuticals and petrochemicals. Out of the five key perpetrators of the Covid fiasco - China, the US, India, the UK and Russia - it appears that only the US and China have taken to hemp cultivation for industrial purposes seriously. India, the UK and Russia appear to be more aligned to cotton and the synthetics. France is Europe's biggest hemp producer. Nepal still has its ancient tradition of extracting hemp fiber. Nepali Times reports, 'Among the rural folk of the western hills of Bajura, Bajhang, Rolpa, Rukum and Darchula, hemp collection is an important pastime. Shepherds spin the fibre into thread while grazing their sheep and cattle. Cannabis plants grow to a height of 20 ft. After harvesting them, villagers shred the leaves and soak the stems in water for up to 20 days. When they are tender the bark is separated from the rest of the plant, smoked above a fire and boiled in ash water. Thin strips are then removed from the bark by hand. "The older generation used to have holes in their thumbnails through which they passed the strips of fibre and wove them to make thread," says Prem Dahal, proprietor of Hemp House. Dahal has been in the hemp business for over 19 years and is one of few who still use Nepali hemp for his products, even after the emergence of Chinese hemp in the market'. In India, hemp is promoted in less than a handful of states - Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Madhya Pradesh, as far as I know - while most other states still dedicate vast resources to cotton cultivation. Since the promotion of cotton over hemp from the time of Gandhi, favoring the mill owners, hardly any state cultivates hemp anymore. This is despite hemp having been legalized in 2010 globally. In fact, the 1961 Single Convention Treaty on Narcotic Drugs itself says. in 'Article 28, CONTROL OF CANNABIS, 2. This Convention shall not apply to the cultivation of the cannabis plant exclusively for industrial purposes (fibre and seed) or horticultural purposes.' So how is it that hardly any nation has cultivated hemp on industrial scales - barring a few like China, France, and recently the US - since then? Cotton cultivation has dominated even as the world moves towards new unexplored regions in climate change. Are today's mill owners so powerful that they can keep hemp from being cultivated by the small farmer anywhere in the world? This is in addition to the vastly increased synthetic fabric industry that mostly does not take sustainability in its consideration. Hemp based textiles are portrayed as a niche area with pricing that is beyond the means of the poorest classes in society. The fact of the matter is that if enough hemp is grown, as it was in the past, there will be enough clothes for the poorest of the poor, clothes that will last much longer than what they have to wear today and cause less damage to the planet. The subsidies to cotton and the synthetic fabric industries enable them to make surplus products that flood the market and landfills fueled by the consumerism that is marketed along with these products. The true cost to the earth for these actions are seldom considered by policy makers.
Reporting on the varieties of hemp found in China, PLOS One reports that 'Our results showed that 100 hemp varieties from China could be classified into 3 distinct clusters, and that the 3 clusters were consistent with the cool temperate, warm temperate, and subtropical zones in China, respectively. These indicated that the climate, created by latitude, temperature, and day length, is a key factor affecting the germplasm diversity of hemp. Although the three clusters from China were physically closer, hemp in Northern China had a greater similarity coefficient with European hemp than with the other two clusters. This is most likely because these two regions are at similar latitudes, and thus have similar climatic conditions... Our results provide a new insight into the study on germplasm resources and systematic classification in hemp, which may be helpful for the introduction, germplasm development, and utilization in different climates, countries, or continents.'
The extent to which the Chinese elites will go to protect their interests can be understood if we look at the fake pandemic Covid 19. Chinese authorities, under President Xi, possibly working in conjunction with the autocratic leaders from the US, India, the UK and Russia - Trump, Modi, Boris Johnson and Putin respectively - created the fake Covid conspiracy. The fake pandemic came at a time when all these autocratic leaders and the industries that they work for as puppets faced the massive threat of increasing attempts at cannabis legalization in various countries, including the US. Not only this, but there was also a massive global outcry against the harms of the fossil fuel industry and direct threat to the autocratic governments from grassroots level movements, activism and liberal thinkers in favor of democracy. The Chinese authorities used Covid to suppress the rising democratic movement in Hong Kong. Modi used Covid to suppress the agitations by Muslim women and farmers. Trump used Covid to suppress the push for federal cannabis legalization. Boris Johnson used Covid to suppress the growing number of people who wanted him to step down. Putin used Covid to ensure that there was no opposition to speak of. In the process all these leaders extended their hold on their nations, barring Johnson who made way from another like replacement in the British Conservative Party. Through the fake pandemic, the synthetic pharmaceutical industry, medical industry and the petrochemical industry doubled their wealth, and that of the elites who invested in them, in the space of two years, especially in China, the US, India, the UK and Russia. Through the manufacture and sale of fake vaccines to supposedly treat the fake pandemic, hundreds of millions were injected with dangerous synthetics that are causing damage to public health in ways that humanity is only starting to unravel. While these so-called vaccines were sold in the rich elite countries of the world, the fake pandemic was used as an excuse to pump people even in the poorest countries with synthetic pharmaceuticals across entire categories including opioids, analgesics, antihistamines, steroids, sedatives, and so on. The petrochemical industry laughed all the way to the bank as vast sections of the global population were exhorted by governments, physicians, celebrities, so-called virus experts, the media and other elites to buy and use petrochemical based masks, sanitizers, disinfectants, PPE kits and so on. The world was flooded with all the very synthetic poisons that humanity needed to cut down on to slow down the impending climate catastrophe. After two years of these elites holding the world hostage, destroying the lives of hundreds of millions of the poor, the working classes, the sick, the elderly and children, when the maintenance of this massive trickery became untenable as the world started looking at the hoax more closely, the elites of almost every nation in the world loosened their hold on the people. This was because the threat of massive violent revolutions against governments became very real following their oppression in the name of the fake pandemic. The benefits of this massive deception on the people were so high for the Chinese authorities that they continued keeping the people locked up and dosing them with the poisons for at least a year after the rest of the world had moved on.
Wuhan, the epicenter of the fake pandemic Covid is also the epicenter of the deadly synthetic opioid fentanyl, showing the nature of operations that emerge from this place. China works closely with the US and Mexico the spread the deadly fentanyl across the world, destroying lives thousands of miles away. El Pais reports about the fentanyl crisis in Mexico and the US, where it says, 'Culiacán, the capital of the Mexican state of Sinaloa, and Philadelphia, the symbol of the largest drug crisis in the history of the United States, are two of the stations along the journey of a dose of fentanyl. And more than 11,000 miles separate Daniel’s needle from the Chinese laboratories in Wuhan, where the chemical precursors necessary to synthesize the drug are manufactured. That cheap white powder that is injected, smoked, or taken in pill form was responsible for two-thirds of the 107,888 overdose deaths recorded in the United States in 2022 — an all-time record. There are about 295 deaths a day, as if a major plane crashed at a New York City airport every morning.' Regarding the Wuhan coronavirus leak hypothesis, Yahoo reported, in June 2021, that 'Because if the hypothesis is right, it will soon start to dawn on people that our mistake was not insufficient reverence for scientists, or inadequate respect for expertise, or not enough censorship on Facebook. It was a failure to think critically about all of the above, to understand that there is no such thing as absolute expertise. Think of all the disasters of recent years: economic neoliberalism, destructive trade policies, the Iraq War, the housing bubble, banks that are “too big to fail,” mortgage-backed securities, the Hillary Clinton campaign of 2016 — all of these disasters brought to you by the total, self-assured unanimity of the highly educated people who are supposed to know what they’re doing, plus the total complacency of the highly educated people who are supposed to be supervising them.' The Intercept reported in September 2021 that 'Newly released documents provide details of U.S.-funded research on several types of coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China. The Intercept has obtained more than 900 pages of documents detailing the work of EcoHealth Alliance, a U.S.-based health organization that used federal money to fund bat coronavirus research at the Chinese laboratory. The trove of documents includes two previously unpublished grant proposals that were funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, as well as project updates relating to EcoHealth Alliance’s research, which has been scrutinized amid increased interest in the origins of the pandemic.'
Six months before the Covid drama hit the world, I wrote in July 2020 that 'Afghanistan and Mexico source the heroin and morphine. Mexico, Thailand, Myanmar and China source the methamphetamine. The Middle East and Eastern Europe sources the amphetamine. The US consumes heroin, cocaine and methamphetamine. Europe consumes heroin, morphine, methamphetamine and amphetamine. Asia consumes heroin, morphine and methamphetamine. Australia consumes methamphetamine. The Middle East consumes heroin and amphetamine. West Asia consumes heroin and methamphetamine. All countries grow and consume cannabis. Opioids, methamphetamine and amphetamines kill the most in terms of drug deaths, cannabis kills none. Who are the leading opponents to cannabis legalization and leading enforcers of global anti-cannabis policy? The countries involved the most in heroin, morphine, amphetamines and methamphetamines. They put on a mask of concern about harms from drugs, produce, sell and consume the most dangerous synthetic drugs and vehemently oppose cannabis legalization worldwide while clandestinely feeding their habits and protecting their sources. They use arms and armies to protect and promote their synthetic drug habits, and drug money to fund and wage a war on cannabis everywhere, pushing man and planet ever closer to death on massive scales and away from the safe, healing cannabis herb...'
In the middle of the Covid drama, I put down a few thoughts. On April 23rd, 2021, I wrote 'The permanent members of the UNSC, US, UK, Russia, China and France are the world's biggest arms traders. India, the eternal aspirant to the elite warmongers council in an organization meant to promote global equity, liberty, peace and harmony, along with Israel and Saudi Arabia are the world's leading arms purchasers. Now, that is not all. Recognize the names and their links to global wars and instability. They are the world's leading legal synthetic drug (known by the much revered name pharma drugs) traders. They are the leading traders of petrochemicals and fossil fuel based energy. They are the world's leading emitters of carbon dioxide and other global warming gases. They are the world's leading traders of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. All of them are ruled by authoritarian governments. They are the countries staging the Covid drama, originating the story, linking their pharma deaths to Covid and then claiming to produce vaccines that will stop the virus. They lead on all Covid statistics. They are the countries instrumental in bringing about the global prohibition of cannabis. They continue to be the leading opposition to global cannabis legalization. They are the leading violators of human rights and liberties through their use of law, incarceration and execution of cannabis users and traders. They are the leading destroyers of cannabis plants and varieties beyond number....' On April 29th, 2021, I wrote regarding the Covid death count that was, in fact, deaths from misuse and abuse of synthetic pharmaceutical medicine, stating 'With the false, all one needs to do is to sit back and wait for the move that makes it one false move too many, cutting off the limb that they have worked themselves out onto. No action from one's side is required. Through the Covid pandemic orchestrated to tighten control over the world, the world's authoritarians have, unwittingly, developed a beautiful mechanism through which it is clear for all the people of the world to see who they truly are. China is, hilariously, way out of the charts itself. The US, Brazil and India are 1st, 2nd and 3rd on the official charts with India fast moving to the official number one spot, reflecting its authoritarian government's unquenchable thirst for power and control. Russia, Britain, the EU, Turkey, all authoritarian governments with chronic elite supremacist complexes and long histories of using their people as fodder to fuel their ambitions of world domination, make up the rest of the top rankers. Within India, the states in which authoritarian government holds power and influence get the top rankings. Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu...Isn't this Covid thing a beauty? The authoritarian government measurement tool par excellence...out on a limb, they cannot stop sawing it off for fear of facing the truth that is their falsehood...the prize awaits the winners...' On February 6th, 2022, I wrote, 'In the last two years humans have witnessed, and been a part of, biological warfare against the world's people by its rulers - the autocrats, pharma companies and petrochemical companies, on a scale unprecedented in the known history of humans...What became first visible as China's attack on its people's attempt at democracy, soon revealed itself on a global scale. The US, under Donald Trump, Russia, India and Britain quickly ramped up their attack on their own people as well as the people of the world. The ingenuity of this biological warfare was that it was disguised as a cure for illness. Never before has humanity queued up to voluntarily get itself dosed by biological weapons as enthusiastically as this. No genocide in the world's history even comes close to this. The short terms effects that can now be seen of this war are tremendous growth in the wealth and power of the autocrats, pharma and petrochemical companies while the world's people experience fevers, colds, lung infections and body pain that have become chronic on a global scale. Our water, food and air are now completely contaminated by the assault while deaths due the adverse effects of this attack have been swept under the carpet. Children's education is disrupted like never before as is the livelihoods and health care of hundreds of millions. Now the same entities, with Biden in place of Trump in the US, play out war games to distract the world's people while continuing to exhort them to further dose themselves with these biological poisons...The long term effects of this war on humans is only starting to unravel...Humanity, by and large, remains completely oblivious of what it is experiencing and witnessing...' On 22nd September 2022, I wrote 'World news update: 22 Sep 2022. Trump and Johnson, two of the architects of Covid-19, the world's biggest scam ever, have cashed in and settled down to enjoy their rich pickings. Three more from this abominable group still remain - Modi, Putin and Xi. Modi has managed to catapult his two petrochemical bosses into the world's top 10 richest men rankings as a result, and funds his election campaigns even better with his earnings; Putin uses his earnings from the scam to fund his Ukraine war and give impetus to his petrochemical and defence industry bosses; Xi has managed to stifle almost all internal dissent having locked up all who oppose him, along with himself, in the name of the scam. The petrochemical and pharma industries now sit pretty on their plunder reaped from the world, while the arms industry is thriving. The world is fighting climate change with more petrochemicals, fossil fuels, synthetic pharmaceuticals and arms...The herd, glued to its smartphone, is eager to see how its ass will be taken this time...sanitized, vaccinated, unmasked and ready...' On October 3rd 2022, I wrote, 'A good way to get a country to legalize ganja would be for its immediate neighbour to legalize. There is usually such competition between neighbouring countries that the idea that one's immediate neighbour may stand to gain immensely from legalization could be a very good motivation for one's own country to legalize. Keeping up with the Joneses i mean the Mary Janes..Canada/USA, Australia/New Zealand, England/Germany, Israel/Iran, China/Japan, North Korea/South Korea...hey Pakistan, I think you guys should legalize because that would surely wake up India too...it's the perfect healthy competition and a win-win for all...gun competition is so uncool...not to mention fatal for the majority...' A few months later, Russia invaded Ukraine with its new-found Covid wealth, and soon Israel started its attacks on its indigenous community, the Palestinians. China and India are still supporting and funding Russia's war effort in Ukraine by buying oil from it.
I am most certain that in many parts of China, especially rural areas, the cultivation and consumption of cannabis goes on as it always has. I am also certain that there exist potentially hundreds of indigenous cannabis varieties in China. The legalization of the plant would vastly increase farming revenues and improve the lives of farmers. Cannabis, as a sustainable agricultural crop, is much more likely to thrive in adverse climatic conditions as compared to rice or cotton. Cannabis based technology can power China's immense energy requirements through bio-fuels, batteries and super capacitors potentially reducing the immense dependency on highly polluting thermal power plants. Use of cannabis-based paper can reduce the felling of trees. Bio-degradable plastic can replace petrochemical based synthetic plastic. Hempcrete building materials can replace concrete. Textile and fabric industries can thrive using cannabis fibers. Exports and trade in the numerous Chinese varieties of cannabis to the growing worldwide cannabis markets could fuel research, industry, business, medicine, the economy and tourism of a truly sustainable nature.
Yet why does China not legalize cannabis? To me it appears to be a mixture of various reasons. The outdated thinking that cannabis for recreational and social use will incite free thinking, independent actions and rebellion among the people possibly ranks high. The success of US propaganda that cannabis has no medicinal value, and the clout of Chinese pharmaceutical, construction and petrochemical industries are probably other reasons. China supplies pharmaceutical raw materials to a large number of countries and global companies. The most likely factor is that even though Greece was where opium was first discovered and used, China soon made opium its own. Western colonial powers helped the surge of opium by trading in it and becoming addicted to it, providing China immense wealth and military power through the trade, and eventually fighting numerous wars to protect Chinese opium. With the taking over of China by the Communist party, the equation has not changed. It is still the same ruling elites, the king-priest-businessman, who oppress the majority of the Chinese people. These various factors have led to a path that is highly unsustainable, leading to the increasing likelihood of a breakdown eventually in terms of environmental damage, internal rebellion or international war, all in a vain effort to try and gain economic and military domination over the world, a totally illusory goal.
If China were to legalize cannabis for recreational use, it would be a truly meaningful way to address the health of its people, industry and environment. Being a country the size that China is, this would also mean addressing the health, industry and environment of a significant part of the world today. That is why it is probably as important for China to legalize recreational cannabis as it is for the US. The US legalization would have a ripple effect on the worldwide cannabis laws since the US was largely instrumental in framing the laws as it now stands for more than 80 years. The Chinese legalization would have a ripple effect in the global battle against climate change and warming, as it is China that is the biggest opponent to global cannabis legalization today in order to protect the industries that destroy the earth. Will China shed its obsession with economic and military domination, ideas that have become irrelevant and in fact outright dangerous for life on the planet as we move towards precarious times because of climate and environmental damage, and will it take a step towards the protection of life on earth especially of its own nation?
In December 2020, the UN voted to remove cannabis from its most restricted Schedule IV category of the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs. It does however still remain in Schedule I, which is the least restrictive. This one move by the UN itself should be sufficient to bring about the recreational legalization of cannabis in every nation and an overhaul of national drug laws, given that most nations cite the UN treaty to keep cannabis prohibited. But that has not happened because the elites of the world, across all nations are united in the opposition of cannabis legalization, despite all the obvious reasons to do so, since it also means a changed world for the current elites. It must be noted that in most places where cannabis legalization has happened it took the efforts of the people who mobilized themselves through grassroots level movements to bring about this change. Left to lawmakers legalization would have been impossible, as the main interests of lawmakers concern the protection of the big industries opposed to cannabis such as pharmaceuticals, petrochemicals, construction, medical, alcohol, tobacco, opium and the black market for all things illegal. For something that truly benefits the people, the people themselves have to make the change.
One needs to look no further than China's cannabis policies to see the dual nature of the ruling elites and how they oppress the vast majority of the people. The ruling elites use opium, possibly cocaine, alcohol, tobacco and synthetic drugs for their pleasure. There may be a smattering of cannabis too, though I think it is most unlike or rare, possibly an act that will result in a swift expulsion from the party and its affiliated sycophants. For the people, it is only the synthetic pharmaceuticals - legal prescription drugs and illegal fentanyl, methamphetamine and NPS - besides the legal drugs alcohol and tobacco. Maybe some of the cheaper versions of opioids that can otherwise be only exported to poorer countries in Asia or Africa. Through industrial hemp, the elites increase their wealth, primarily in the textile sector. Those farmers involved in the industrial hemp sector earn a decent livelihood. Ganja and charas are the anathema of the ruling elites in China. If it is legalized for adult recreational use and medicine, it will blow away the legal and illegal synthetic pharmaceutical industry, as it will opium and its derivatives. The alcohol industry in China would not be such a significant opposition to cannabis, I think, unlike in Europe and North America. The tobacco industry will definitely feel the pinch. Areas like food, beverages, wellness, tourism, animal feed, etc. will benefit greatly from cannabis legalization. The black market for drugs will shrink which is something that the ruling elites. including the law enforcement-drug cartel-politician nexus, will not like. Besides the opioid industry, and the legal and illegal synthetic pharmaceutical industry, the industry that is going to feel the biggest impact of cannabis legalization is the fossil fuel industry and its allied industries. Fossil-fuel dependent construction businesses, petrochemical-dependent non-biodegradable plastics, synthetic fabrics, chemical fertilizer and pesticide manufacturers, automobile part manufacturers, even the synthetic pharmaceutical industry and medical industry that is dependent on petrochemical based products will suffer greatly if industrial cannabis is given a free hand, unlike the current state where it is only the textile sector that appears to be utilizing the bulk of industrial hemp in China.
For China to become truly sustainable, to become the great nation that it once was during the time of Lao Tzu, Confucius and the Tao Te Ching, for the grand style that Nietzsche wrote about in The Will to Power to return, and to break free from that Orwellian world that it finds itself in now, China cannot continue to ignore cannabis as ganja and charas. Otherwise, like in the Covid fiasco, the rest of the world would have moved on, with only China, possibly in the company of its disreputable associates - India, Russia, the US and Britain - still trying to poison its own people and nature through the love for synthetics and the oppression of the people by the elites. China focuses on economic activity that involves humongous projects undertaken in complete disregard for nature. Building infrastructure to enable the elite business classes to do business such as ports, highways and dams that slice through nature, with little regard for the implications to the natural world, have been one of China's strategies in the recent past. The construction industry, with its heavy reliance on fossil fuel based raw materials, benefits immensely. The real estate crisis, the fake Covid fiasco and the proposed plan to build the world's biggest hydroelectric dam in the Tibetan region are examples of China's economic direction. In terms of political direction, the country appears headed for a blank wall, unless there is a revolution among the people to break the hold of the Communist Party and the elite ruling classes. Otherwise, all decisions that are taken will be in favor of the elites, only increasing the hardship of the people. The revolution that is best is the cannabis revolution, peaceful going back to nature, the ancient culture and the classical style of the Tao Te Ching. Everywhere in the world where cannabis reform happened, the people went against the conformity of the class and caste system and grew their cannabis and used it like any other plant. The movement caught on so fast that soon communities were growing cannabis together and sharing it. This led the state to revisit its cannabis policies since if the state did not intervene, it was likely that it would not be able to get a share of the cannabis pie through taxes and revenue. It is to stall the eventual complete legalization of cannabis - where it is no different than any other plant - that the state creates regulation and licensing policies. Once these hurdles between the people and the cannabis plant also cease to exist, then we can say that the elites and the other classes of society have achieved some form of equality. B. R. Ambedkar said that for economic or political reform to happen, first there has to be social reform. He was speaking in the context of India's caste system, but this applies as much to China. China's ruling elites, comprising the Communist Party and its power structure - the king-priest-businessman hierarchy - are the upper castes in China. The working classes, the poor and the indigenous communities, who together form the majority of China's population are the lowest castes, oppressed by the ruling elites. Like the stars on China's flag, the elites are the big star while the rest of society comprise the four smaller stars. Ambedkar said that social reform is not complete as long as one class oppresses another. Cannabis legalization, i.e. the legalization of ganja and charas, so that it is available to the poorest persons in Chinese society, where they are free to grow, buy, sell, or use in whichever way they choose, without any regulations or limits, is the social reform that will bridge the gap in China between the elites and the oppressed classes. Once cannabis has regained its place in Chinese society, as the herb of the poorest classes, then the steps for political and economic reform can take place. Until then, all talk in China about its greatness is just hollow and synthetic. Not only that, this delusion of the Chinese elites is a global threat to not just human society, but to the entire planet as well.
If China, India and the US fully legalize cannabis - and I am talking about ganja and charas here (cannabis with THC levels well above 0.3%), not industrial hemp or medical cannabis - allowing farmers to freely cultivate the crop without any hindrances, these three countries can enter into a beautiful trade relationship for cannabis, exchanging the best varieties of their lands with each other and basking in the harmony of the cannabis plant. That is much better for the world than the exchange of petrochemicals, synthetic pharmaceuticals - legal and illegal, chemical pesticides and fertilizers, non-biodegradable plastic, synthetic fabrics, which is basically shitting in the neighbour's garden. Adding cannabis to China will add the green to the red and gold that China's flag exhibits. The path of the Tao Te Ching is most simple, and it is this simplicity that needs to be cultivated...
Related articles
Listed below are articles taken from various media related to the above subject. Words in italics are the thoughts of your truly at the time of reading the article.
Culiacán, the capital of the Mexican state of Sinaloa, and Philadelphia, the symbol of the largest drug crisis in the history of the United States, are two of the stations along the journey of a dose of fentanyl. And more than 11,000 miles separate Daniel’s needle from the Chinese laboratories in Wuhan, where the chemical precursors necessary to synthesize the drug are manufactured. That cheap white powder that is injected, smoked, or taken in pill form was responsible for two-thirds of the 107,888 overdose deaths recorded in the United States in 2022 — an all-time record. There are about 295 deaths a day, as if a major plane crashed at a New York City airport every morning.
Indian hemp is classified as a dangerous drug under the Dangerous Drugs Act 2000 with its possession being banned, except for very limited scientific and medical purposes by authorized personnel.
Stubbs however contended that the drug is a ‘sacred herb’, used as a sacrament in manifesting his faith as a Rastafarian and that he has a constitutional right to possess and use it.
Stubbs also contended that to the extent that the DDA does not contain an exemption for religious use, its blanket criminal sanctions on the possession of cannabis infringe on his right to practice his faith freely.
In the 40-page decision, Justice Klein differentiated between Indian hemp and marijuana, stating that while they belong to the same cannabis genus, they are of different varieties of the hemp family. He also highlighted that hemp has been used lawfully for medicinal and other purposes in India and China for thousands of years until its international criminalization following the International Opium Conference in 1925.
In his judgment, Klein said that he found nothing anti-democratic or anti-rights in Parliament’s decision not to make allowances for the religious or recreational use of marijuana.
....
The judge accepted that the failure to make provision for the religious use of marijuana amounted to an interference with Stubbs’ rights to observe and manifest his religion.
“I also find that there is sufficient evidence and other material before the court to establish that the impugned provisions of the Dangerous Drugs Act (DDA) are reasonably required to attain public policy objectives, whether for public health or safety.
“Furthermore, in my judgment, the applicant has not provided any evidence or other material to satisfy the court that the failure to make an exemption for religious use is not justifiable in a democratic society, or that the legislative measures in the DDA are disproportionate to their objectives,” the judge noted.
'Law said there was a misconception that cannabis is harmless as it is a herb.
"Drugs such as heroin and cocaine are also derived from herbs, so such a saying is misleading. Therefore, the SAR government will not legalize the use of cannabis."'
'The message of CBD is certainly spreading in Hong Kong, embraced by both the healthy (there's a CBD yoga lounge at popular studio Yoga Bam Bam) and the hedonistic (craft brewer Young Master Ales offers a range of CBD beers). Still, Mullen is hardly satisfied.
"There's a large part of the population that I'm not reaching," says Mullen.
While Hong Kong has a deeply ingrained culture of taking herbal remedies for health conditions and general wellness, there is mostly a stigma against anything related to cannabinoids.'
'No global picture of hemp is complete without China, which is believed to be the world’s top hemp producer. Thousands of years before hemp-derived CBD became a hot commodity, China was cultivating the plant for fiber and seed production.
Like much of the world, China eventually banned hemp. But it didn’t take long for the country to resume its place in the hemp industry once the prohibition was lifted in 2010. The “industry has exploded and is set to grow even further,” noted a report about China released in February by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service.
According to the FAS report, China produces more than half the world’s hemp supply. Chinese hemp–fiber sales were estimated at $1.2 billion in 2018, although the government does not release official cultivation, production or sales data. '
'NIHC says it plans to focus its advocacy on China and Europe as “top priority markets,” aiming to develop relationships and trade policies that will promote the sale of hemp products that are manufactured domestically.
The federal government has also recognized the market potential of China for the crop, which historically has been a main source of hemp imports. A trade deal announced at the beginning of the year requires the country to import hemp from the U.S. on a larger scale over the next two years.'
'Results
65 primary articles (18 clinical, 47 pre-clinical) were reviewed. Several randomised controlled trials showed hempseed pills (in Traditional Chinese Medicine formulation MaZiRenWan) improving spontaneous bowel movement in functional constipation. There was also evidence suggesting benefits in cannabis dependence, epilepsy, and anxiety disorders. Pre-clinically, hemp derivatives showed potential anti-oxidative, anti-hypertensive, anti-inflammatory, anti-diabetic, anti-neuroinflammatory, anti-arthritic, anti-acne, and anti-microbial activities. Renal protective effects and estrogenic properties were also exhibited in vitro.'
'China’s 13th Five-Year Plan lays out the country’s intention to cultivate 3.2 million acres of fiber hemp for textiles by 2030. That move is being fueled by a desire to supplant cotton with less environmentally taxing crops, part of the country’s ambitions to beat the U.S. and the EU in achieving net-zero carbon emissions. Early support and investment from the Chinese government has put the country at the forefront of innovation in hemp fiber, and is largely responsible for the country’s 70% market share in the space.
As governments, companies, and entrepreneurs compete to create and implement carbon-neutral technologies, China is likely to remain a major player in the expanding development of the global hemp industry.'
'Because if the hypothesis is right, it will soon start to dawn on people that our mistake was not insufficient reverence for scientists, or inadequate respect for expertise, or not enough censorship on Facebook. It was a failure to think critically about all of the above, to understand that there is no such thing as absolute expertise. Think of all the disasters of recent years: economic neoliberalism, destructive trade policies, the Iraq War, the housing bubble, banks that are “too big to fail,” mortgage-backed securities, the Hillary Clinton campaign of 2016 — all of these disasters brought to you by the total, self-assured unanimity of the highly educated people who are supposed to know what they’re doing, plus the total complacency of the highly educated people who are supposed to be supervising them.'
'Qinggang County in China’s Heilongjiang Province expects to harvest hemp from 40,000 acres (~16,200 hectares) in 2021 as the government increases its support for development of high-tech solutions in the world’s capital of hemp textile production.
The planting area for industrial hemp in Qinggang county has steadily grown from 1,500 acres (~607 hectares) in 2016 to feed a robust field-to-shelf industrial supply chain. Qinggang County officials say 6,600 acres (~2,600 hectares) of hemp were planted for research purposes alone in the county this year.
Heilongjiang Province accounts for half of the world’s production of hemp fiber, and Qinggang County makes 70% of that output; all hemp yarns exported from Heilongjiang Province come from Qinggang, according to provincial officials.'
'Newly released documents provide details of U.S.-funded research on several types of coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China. The Intercept has obtained more than 900 pages of documents detailing the work of EcoHealth Alliance, a U.S.-based health organization that used federal money to fund bat coronavirus research at the Chinese laboratory. The trove of documents includes two previously unpublished grant proposals that were funded by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, as well as project updates relating to EcoHealth Alliance’s research, which has been scrutinized amid increased interest in the origins of the pandemic.'
'The United States is committed to working together with the countries of the Western Hemisphere as neighbors and partners to meet our shared challenges of drug trafficking and use. My Administration will seek to expand cooperation with key partners, such as Mexico and Colombia, to shape a collective and comprehensive response and expand efforts to address the production and trafficking of dangerous synthetic drugs that are responsible for many of our overdose deaths, particularly fentanyl, fentanyl analogues, and methamphetamine. In Mexico, we must continue to work together to intensify efforts to dismantle transnational criminal organizations and their networks, increase prosecutions of criminal leaders and facilitators, and strengthen efforts to seize illicit assets. In Bolivia, I encourage the government to take additional steps to safeguard the country’s licit coca markets from criminal exploitation and reduce illicit coca cultivation that continues to exceed legal limits under Bolivia’s domestic laws for medicinal and traditional use. In addition, the United States will look to expand cooperation with China, India, and other chemical source countries in order to disrupt the global flow of synthetic drugs and their precursor chemicals. '
'While hemp has been grown in China for centuries, liberalization of production, processing, and use regulations have only come in recent years. China’s hemp regulations are opaque, incomplete, ever-changing, and vary by province. These regulations continue to change as hemp and hemp products gain more consumer awareness and popularity. However, only a few provinces regulate hemp and streamlined national guidelines do not exist. This report lays out Post’s understanding of China’s hemp product import requirements as of September 2021. Interested exporters are strongly encouraged to work with their importers for the most accurate and current requirements.'
'According to United States authorities, most of the fentanyls destined for the North American market have been manufactured in China in recent years, from where they were either shipped directly to the United States, mostly through postal services, or were first shipped to Mexico and, to a lesser extent, Canada and then smuggled into the United States. However, after the introduction by China in May 2019 of drug controls based on generic legislation with regard to the fentanyls, which effectively brought more than 1,400 known fentanyl analogues under national control in China, early signs suggest that fewer fentanyls were smuggled from China to North America. At the same time, attempts to manufacture fentanyl and its analogues inside North America are increasing, notably in Mexico, by means of a method using precursor chemicals smuggled into the subregion from East Asia and South Asia.' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_BOOKLET_4.pdf
'After marked increases over the 2009-2012 period, the overall quantities of synthetic NPS seized have shown a downward trend since 2012, most notably when they fell from 44 tons in 2017 to 10 tons in 2018. This may partly reflect the fact that some of the most widely used and most harmful NPS have been put under national and international control in recent years and therefore, according to the current definition, no longer belong to the NPS category. Moreover, a number of countries in North America, Europe and Oceania, where major markets for NPS are located, have introduced various controls on NPS trade in recent years. In parallel, China, which is frequently mentioned as the main country of origin or departure for various synthetic NPS (with 27 per cent of all such mentions over the 2014–2018 period, ahead of India with 10 per cent), has introduced controls in various waves on the manufacture of and trade in such substances. This and other developments appear to have had an impact on the proliferation of NPS at the global level, reducing the quantities of those substances on key markets.' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_BOOKLET_4.pdf
'While China does not report data on drug treatment admissions, the majority of registered drug users (nearly 60 per cent) in 2018 comprised users of synthetic drugs (mainly methamphetamine)' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_2.pdf
'A small number of countries continue to account for a large proportion of the total global number of PWID [persons who inject drugs] living with HIV. In 2018, for example, PWID living with HIV in China, Pakistan and the Russian Federation accounted for almost half of the global total (49 per cent), while PWID in those three countries comprise only a third of all PWID worldwide.' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_2.pdf
'The clandestine manufacture of fentanyls within North America is thus not really a new phenomenon and has the potential to increase in importance following the recent control of fentanyls substances in China. - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_BOOKLET_4.pdf
'The most significant trafficking activities worldwide of opiates not of Afghan origin concern opiates produced in South-East Asia (mostly Myanmar), which are trafficked to other markets in East and SouthEast Asia (mostly China and Thailand) and to Oceania (mostly Australia). Seizures made in those countries accounted for 11 per cent of the global quantities of heroin and morphine seized (excluding seizures made by Afghanistan) in 2018, down from 15 per cent in 2015. This went in parallel with reported reductions in opium production in Myanmar of 20 per cent over the period 2005–2018.' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'The decline in the domestic supply of methamphetamine, indicated by the falling number of manufacturing facilities dismantled in the United States, going hand in hand with increasing use and an overall increase in the supply of the drug, can be explained by the increasing importance of rapidly growing illegal methamphetamine imports from clandestine manufacture sites in neighbouring Mexico. According to the United States authorities, the latter phenomenon appears to have resulted from attempts by Mexican organized crime groups to diversify their drug portfolio as they attempted to reduce their dependence on cocaine produced in countries in South America, preferring instead to source the required chemicals from China and produce methamphetamine themselves. Methamphetamine shipments intercepted along the south-western border of the United States increased almost fourfold between 2013 and 2018.' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'The region with the next largest number of methamphetamine laboratories dismantled was Asia, accounting for 6 per cent of the global total in the period 2014–2018. Most of these facilities were dismantled in China and the Islamic Republic of Iran, which together accounted for 94 per cent of all reported laboratories dismantled in Asia, while some clandestine methamphetamine laboratories were also dismantled, in descending order of importance, in Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, India, the Republic of Korea, Myanmar and Hong Kong, China. - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'Countries identified as significant source countries for methamphetamine shipments in Asia in the period 2014–2018 included Myanmar, followed by China, Thailand, India and Iran (Islamic Republic of). Clandestine methamphetamine manufacture in Asia seems to be still largely based on the use of pseudoephedrine or ephedrine as precursors, although reports from Afghanistan suggest that ephedrine is extracted from ephedra plant material and used as a precursor for methamphetamine. The authorities in Myanmar and Thailand have reported the seizure of increasing quantities of sodium cyanide and benzyl cyanide in recent years. These substances can be used for synthesizing P-2-P, which is then used to manufacture either amphetamine or methamphetamine.' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'Similar to the situation in the United States, where the manufacture of methamphetamine declined while increasing in neighbouring Mexico, both China and Iran (Islamic Republic of) reported declining domestic production, reflected in the decreasing numbers of methamphetamine laboratories dismantled in recent years, going hand in hand with the expansion of methamphetamine manufacture in their neighbouring countries. Indeed, by 2018 the Islamic Republic of Iran reported that most of the methamphetamine found on its territory originated in Afghanistan and was trafficked either from there directly or via Pakistan. Similarly, China reported that methamphetamine seized in recent years has originated primarily in Myanmar. In contrast to many other countries, however, the marked declines in the domestic manufacture of methamphetamine in China appear to have more than outweighed any increase in clandestine manufacture and imports from neighbouring countries. This is revealed in the decline in methamphetamine found in the wastewater in cities across China, with wastewater-based estimates suggesting a fall in methamphetamine consumption amounts of 26 per cent over the period 2014 –2018' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'The largest quantities of methamphetamine seized in 2018 were the quantities seized in the United States, followed by Thailand and Mexico. Marked increases in the quantities seized from 2017 to 2018 were reported by the United States and Thailand, while the quantities of methamphetamine seized in China declined, in line with reports of wastewater analysis that showed a significant decline in methamphetamine consumption in that country.' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'The United States, for example, has been reported by other countries as a country of departure of methamphetamine for Oceania (Australia and New Zealand), Asia (Japan, the Philippines, Hong Kong, China and Mongolia) and Europe (Ireland).' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'Quantities of methamphetamine seized in East and South-East Asia increased eightfold over the period 2009–2018, to close to 100 tons, and preliminary data for 2019 show further strong increases in the quantities of methamphetamine seized, in particular in South-East Asia, with increases reported in 2019 by, among other countries, Brunei Daraussalam, Cambodia. Hong Kong, China, Indonesia, Japan, the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Myanmar, the Philippines, Singapore and Viet Nam. In most years in the past decade the largest quantities of methamphetamine seized in East and South-East Asia were reported by China. In 2018, by contrast, 66 per cent of all the methamphetamine seized in that subregion was seized in Thailand, followed by Indonesia (8 per cent) and Malaysia (8 per cent) and only then by China (6 per cent), reflecting underlying shifts in the methamphetamine market in South-East Asia, that is, a decline in the methamphetamine market in China in parallel with ongoing increases in the ASEAN countries.' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'This shift from China as the main location of methamphetamine manufacture and trafficking to other countries in East and South-East Asia is also indirectly reflected in trafficking data reported by Australia. China and Hong Kong, China, were the two main embarkation points for methamphetamine trafficked to Australia in 2015, whereas in the fiscal years 2016/17 and 2017/18 the most important embarkation points were the United States, followed by Thailand and Malaysia. In fact, in 2018, the Australian authorities reported that the importance of China as a source country for methamphetamine had declined while there has been an emerging trend in the growth of quantities of seized methamphetamine originating in South-East Asia, mainly in the Mekong region, including the Lao People’s Democratic Republic, Myanmar and Thailand.' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'Most of the methamphetamine available in East and South-East Asia is sourced within the subregion. The dynamics of methamphetamine manufacture and trafficking within that subregion are, however, less well understood than in others as the available indicators show partly contradictory patterns. Although in previous years, China and Myanmar were identified as the most frequently identified countries of “origin”, “departure” and “transit” in East and South-East Asia, manufacture of methamphetamine may now be more widely spread across the subregion, although it is not clear whether frequently mentioned departure countries, such as Malaysia or Thailand, are also the countries of origin or mainly transit countries for methamphetamine manufactured in Myanmar. In fact, Myanmar reported Thailand and the Lao People’s Democratic Republic as main destination countries for methamphetamine shipments in 2018, while Malaysia reported Thailand as the main departure country' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'While methamphetamine trafficking flows from East and South-East Asia to countries outside the subregion remain modest, some smuggling to destinations around the world was reported, mainly smuggling from Malaysia, Thailand and Myanmar in 2018 or, when the period is extended to the past five years, mainly from China and Thailand. Destinations outside the subregion included countries in South Asia, the Near and Middle East (Saudi Arabia as well as Israel), Oceania (Australia and New Zealand), North America (the United States as well as Canada), Western Europe (notably Switzerland as well as Italy, Germany, France, Spain and Iceland), Eastern Europe (notably the Russian Federation) and Africa (notably South Africa) over the period 2014–2018' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'Methamphetamine found in Australia and New Zealand is both locally manufactured and, to a larger extent, imported from North America and Asia. In the fiscal year 2017/18, methamphetamine was mainly smuggled into Australia from the United States, followed by Thailand, Malaysia, the United Arab Emirates, Canada, China (including Hong Kong, China), Mexico, Lebanon, Viet Nam and India. The United States was also the main source country of the methamphetamine found in New Zealand in 2018, followed by Canada and, in SouthEast Asia, by Malaysia and the Lao People’s Democratic Republic' - United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, World Drug Report 2020, https://wdr.unodc.org/wdr2020/field/WDR20_Booklet_3.pdf
'China hoped “the WHO will continue to strengthen its research on the dangers and risks of abuse of cannabis.”'
'—Cannabis seeds macrofossils were found attached to pieces of broken ceramic in central Japan dating back about 10,000 years.
—Shen Nung, a Chinese emperor around 2,700 BCE who is also considered the father of Chinese medicine, reportedly regarded marijuana as a “first-class herb” that was not dangerous.
—According to Vedic texts from around 800 BCE, cannabis was used in religious rituals but also for its “analgesic, anesthetic, antiparasitic, antispastic, and diuretic properties” and “as an expectorating agent, as an aphrodisiac, to treat convulsions, to stimulate hunger, and to relieve from fatigue.”
—Marijuana was considered a “holy plant” in Tibet and was used in Tantric Buddhism to “facilitate meditations.”'
It's easy to identify authoritarian governments these days...you're most likely to find them on top of the international arms trade lists as well...
'A statement posted on the website of the Chinese consulate in Toronto reminds citizens in its jurisdiction to avoid using marijuana to ensure their physical and mental health.'
'Felbab-Brown says China's new stance on fentanyl-related substances stems partially from a desire to be a global enforcer on drugs. "From a public relations perspective, it's difficult for China to be accused of being a source of drugs," she says.
China does not have a monopoly on fentanyl production, she adds. "Even if tomorrow the United States wouldn't get fentanyl from China, others would step in. Most obviously India, a major source of addictive drugs."'
'Marijuana use in China is strictly forbidden. In fact, when Canada legalized cannabis last year, the Chinese government sternly reminded its citizens living in or visiting the country to “please avoid contact or using marijuana.”
Yet, despite their nation’s strict views on marijuana, research shows that significant numbers of Chinese tourists are heading to Amsterdam to take part in its prolific cannabis culture. A new study published in the journal Current Issues in Tourism sheds light on some of the motivations for the cross-continental cannatourism.'
'Our results showed that 100 hemp varieties from China could be classified into 3 distinct clusters, and that the 3 clusters were consistent with the cool temperate, warm temperate, and subtropical zones in China, respectively. These indicated that the climate, created by latitude, temperature, and day length, is a key factor affecting the germplasm diversity of hemp. Although the three clusters from China were physically closer, hemp in Northern China had a greater similarity coefficient with European hemp than with the other two clusters. This is most likely because these two regions are at similar latitudes, and thus have similar climatic conditions... Our results provide a new insight into the study on germplasm resources and systematic classification in hemp, which may be helpful for the introduction, germplasm development, and utilization in different climates, countries, or continents.'
'When thinking of the booming legal cannabis industry, the majority of analysts are following the developments in the United States, Canada and Israel. It makes sense, since these world superpowers are already bringing in billions of dollars annually on both medical and recreational pot.
But there is another cannabis powerhouse quietly developing that you may not expect—China.
According to a recent report from the South China Morning Post, a small number of Chinese provinces, including Heilongjiang, near the Russian border, and Yunnan to the south, now make up nearly half of the world’s legal hemp cultivation.'
'Given both its size and cultural experience of centuries’ worth of cultivation of cannabis sativa for the plant’s strong fibers used to manufacture paper, fabric, and rope, it is not surprising that China is the world’s leader in hemp cultivation, processing, manufacturing, and exports. Until recently, China maintained half of the world’s total planting area for industrial hemp, along with half of the world’s cannabis-related patents. In 2017, Chinese domestic consumer sales of hemp were estimated at $1.1 billion (USD), or more than 1/3 of the global market. Already boasting such a substantial hemp-derived textile industry, the country’s growing CBD market is likewise poised to dominate as consumers become more familiar with the increasingly destigmatized product’s versatility.'
Weekly CannaBit from New Frontier Data
With global demand for hemp surging, China’s sector is poised for years of dramatic growth.
In 2017, Chinese hemp sales totaled $1.1 billion (USD), approaching 1/3 of the $3.1 billion global market, with sales forecasted to grow to $1.5 billion (up 36%) by 2020.
In 2017, textiles accounted for about 3/4 of China’s overall sales of $823 million (USD).
Hemp-derived CBD accounted for Chinese sales of $53 million (USD) in 2017 but is forecasted to more than quadruple (by 4.3x, to $228 million) by 2020.
Demand for CBD products in both Japan and South Korea – countries with high relative spending for wellness and cosmetics – could further catalyze demand for China’s hemp-derived CBD
As Grateful Dead sang in Truckin' - What in the world ever became of sweet Jane? She lost her sparkle, you know she isn't the same. Livin' on reds, vitamin C, and cocaine, All a friend can say is "Ain't it a shame?...Lately it occurs to me what a long, strange trip it's been.
'From China, coastal farmers brought pot to Korea about 2000 B.C. or earlier, according to the book "The Archeology of Korea" (Cambridge University Press, 1993). Cannabis came to the South Asian subcontinent between 2000 B.C. and 1000 B.C., when the region was invaded by the Aryans — a group that spoke an archaic Indo-European language. The drug became widely used in India, where it was celebrated as one of "five kingdoms of herbs ... which release us from anxiety" in one of the ancient Sanskrit Vedic poems whose name translate into "Science of Charms."'
Hey junkie, this dope is not against you. Of course he believes that his dope is a much better intoxicant, more versatile medicine and more useful to the planet than your junk but that doesn't mean he intends to ban your junk in retribution for you helping to get his dope banned. What he does want, however, is that you start growing your own plant at home like him. In this way, you source your junk directly from the plant instead of putting money in the pockets of chemists who increasingly make more and more toxic stuff that destroy you, me and the planet. Your money is making the chemist pay the government to arm itself and protect him while pushing you and me closer to death. Growing your own plant will give you organic healthy junk in the best possible way, directly from the plant, like how it used to be for thousands of years, making you sustainable and the planet sustainable...yes, you can go green too...don't remain snowblind..we need your eyes too, to steer the planet away from man-made chemical disaster...
'Among the rural folk of the western hills of Bajura, Bajhang, Rolpa, Rukum and Darchula, hemp collection is an important pastime. Shepherds spin the fibre into thread while grazing their sheep and cattle.
Cannabis plants grow to a height of 20 ft. After harvesting them, villagers shred the leaves and soak the stems in water for up to 20 days. When they are tender the bark is separated from the rest of the plant, smoked above a fire and boiled in ash water. Thin strips are then removed from the bark by hand.
"The older generation used to have holes in their thumbnails through which they passed the strips of fibre and wove them to make thread," says Prem Dahal, proprietor of Hemp House. Dahal has been in the hemp business for over 19 years and is one of few who still use Nepali hemp for his products, even after the emergence of Chinese hemp in the market'
'Most of the North American supply of aspirin, for example, comes from China, which produces about 120 billion tablets per year.' - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3470633/
China is the largest supplier of Ibuprofen, with a production market share nearly 48% in 2016. India is the second largest supplier of Ibuprofen, enjoying production market share nearly 30.7% in 2016.
Paracetamol also does not treat inflammation. Its properties are said to be purely analgesic and febrifuge. China is the largest supplier of paracetamol to the pharmaceutical industry due to its ability to manufacture the active pharmaceutical ingredient at a fraction of the cost of European companies. As per the following article from 2009, China and India are the largest manufacturers of paracetamol. Together they produced 70% of the global market at about 115,000 tonnes per year.
'For the farmers, the crop is green gold - hemp brings in more than 10,000 yuan (NZ$2,075) per hectare, compared to just a few thousand for more common crops like corn. It also has few natural enemies so there's little need for expensive pesticides.
"That's pure profit," Jiang said.
Jiang's farm is close to the Arctic Circle and one of the country's major centres for the legal crop. Authorities in the province turned a blind eye to its production before legalising and regulating it last year. Another major growing area is in Yunnan province where the plant's production has been regulated since 2003.
Together, these areas account for about half of the world's legal commercial cropland under hemp cannabis cultivation, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.'
'After his death, a notebook of poetry written by Morrison was recovered, titled Paris Journal; amongst other personal details, it contains the allegorical foretelling of a man who will be left grieving and having to abandon his belongings, due to a police investigation into a death connected to the Chinese opium trade. "Weeping, he left his pad on orders from police and furnishings hauled away, all records and mementos, and reporters calculating tears & curses for the press: 'I hope the Chinese junkies get you' and they will for the [opium] poppy rules the world".' - https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Jim_Morrison#Poetry_and_film
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