Toggle menu
160
104
40
3.4K
Landrace.Wiki - The Landrace Cannabis Wiki
Toggle preferences menu
Toggle personal menu
Not logged in
Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits.

Cambodia

From Landrace.Wiki - The Landrace Cannabis Wiki
Cambodia
កម្ពុជា (Kampuchea)
Flag
Capital Phnom Penh
Continent Asia
Gene Pool Southeast Asian
Cannabis Status
Legal Status
Status Since 1996
Enforcement Active eradication campaigns
Documentation
Growing Regions 1
Growing Areas 0
Accessions 1


Cambodia (កម្ពុជា, Kampuchea) has one of the most extensively documented cannabis histories in Southeast Asia, spanning from traditional culinary and medicinal use to large-scale commercial export and, ultimately, externally driven prohibition. The Khmer term for cannabis is គញ្ជា (kancha), derived from Sanskrit ganja — pointing to introduction from India, probably via maritime trade networks around the 16th century.[1]

Cannabis was openly cultivated along the Mekong floodplains and in the southwestern coastal mountains for generations, integrated into Traditional Khmer Medicine and everyday cuisine — particularly as a flavouring in soups and stir-fries. Open market trade persisted in Phnom Penh through the mid-1990s, with cannabis sold alongside traditional herbs and medicines for as little as US$4 per kilogram.[2] By 1997, an international anti-drug workshop in Japan identified Cambodia as the second-largest source of seized marijuana in Europe, behind only Colombia.[3]

Criminalisation came in December 1996 under heavy pressure from the United States, which had added Cambodia to its list of major drug transit countries earlier that year — citing heroin trafficking rather than cannabis production as the formal justification.[4] Today, cannabis cultivation is concentrated in the mountains of Kirivong district in Takeo province, where annual eradication campaigns destroy tens of thousands of plants, yet multi-generational cultivation persists.[5]

Colonial and Post-Independence Vacuum

Cannabis was never regulated under the French Protectorate of Cambodia (1863–1953). The colonial administration's relationship with intoxicants was fundamentally fiscal: the Régie Générale de l'Opium, established in 1897, generated up to 37% of the entire Indochinese colonial budget through a state monopoly on opium manufacture and sale.[6] Cannabis — generating negligible revenue and posing no perceived social threat — was entirely absent from this regulatory apparatus. France's metropolitan Law of 12 July 1916 listed "haschich et ses préparations" as a controlled substance alongside opium and cocaine, but multiple French legal historians confirm this law was barely applied in the colonies, where the state itself was dealing in a listed narcotic.[7]

A 1952 United Nations Narcotics Report for Cambodia — filed just before independence — confirms this colonial-era indifference, stating that "Cambodia has no traffic in dangerous drugs with the exception of opium." Cannabis is not mentioned.[8]

No domestic Cambodian legislation addressing cannabis existed between independence in 1953 and the UNTAC period in 1992. There is no evidence of any Sihanouk-era (1953–1970), Khmer Republic (1970–1975), or People's Republic of Kampuchea (1979–1989) statute governing cannabis cultivation, sale, or use.

The 1961 Single Convention

A widely repeated claim that cannabis became "technically illegal" in Cambodia through the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs is substantially misleading. Cambodia signed the Convention on 30 March 1961 but did not ratify it until 7 July 2005 — over 44 years later.[9] Signing creates only a political commitment; it does not create binding legal obligations to implement provisions domestically. The US State Department's 1998 International Narcotics Control Strategy Report confirmed that Cambodia was still taking steps to become a party to the major UN drug conventions at that date.[10] Cambodia completed accession to the 1972 Protocol amending the Convention in September 2007.

The UNTAC Code

The UNTAC transitional criminal code (1992–1993) introduced the first potentially applicable modern framework, providing for jail terms of 5–15 years for smuggling addictive drugs and 1 month to 1 year for drug users. However, Phnom Penh anti-drug department chief Heng Poev acknowledged in 1995 that the law was "apparently unclear on whether possession or growing of marijuana are also offenses."[2] The law was essentially unenforced regarding cannabis.

The 1996 Law on Drug Management

In February 1996, US President Bill Clinton formally added Cambodia to the American list of major illicit drug producing and drug transit countries under Section 490(h) of the Foreign Assistance Act. The letter focused almost exclusively on heroin transit — citing a 71 kg heroin seizure in a speedboat in Koh Kong province — and did not mention cannabis production despite Cambodia's significant export trade.[4] Cambodia was dependent on foreign aid for approximately 40% of its national budget, making it highly vulnerable to US policy pressure.[3]

On 9 December 1996, the National Assembly passed the Law on Drug Management (Loi sur la gestion de la drogue) by a vote of 84 to 2.[11] The legislation was drafted by the UNDCP (United Nations International Drug Control Programme) and reviewed by the US Departments of State and Justice. It classified Cannabis indica and Cannabis sativa in Table I — "plants and substances which cause severe dangers but which are not useful for medicine" — the most restrictive category, alongside heroin.[12]

Contemporary criticism was withering. A human rights lawyer told the Phnom Penh Post that "many MPs didn't see the logic of or the need for the law" and alleged most voted for it because of pressure from the United States and the UNDCP.[11] The law was "rammed through parliament much faster than usual, ahead of other laws which many Cambodians felt had a higher priority."[3] Human Rights Watch/Asia warned the law "does not sufficiently take into account the current deterioration of the human rights situation in Cambodia."[11]

Under Article 38 of the subsequent Law on Drug Control, anyone who intentionally cultivates narcotic plants faces imprisonment of six months to two years and a fine of 1–4 million riel (US$245–975). If the offence is committed for distribution, production, or trade, the penalty increases to two to five years imprisonment with fines of 4–10 million riel (US$975–2,435).[13]

Despite the legal framework, enforcement has historically been selective and inconsistent. Cannabis is technically classified alongside heroin and methamphetamines,[14] but in practice "authorities often make exceptions for traditional or personal use."[14] Small-scale growers are routinely educated and released after signing pledges not to reoffend, while large-scale commercial operations face prosecution — though arrests remain rare even in major eradication operations.

In 2023–2024, Prime Minister Hun Manet explicitly rejected foreign proposals for medical cannabis investment, stating: "As long as I remain PM, marijuana investment law will not be implemented."

History

Traditional Use

The foundational academic source on traditional cannabis use in Cambodia is the ethnobotanist Marie Alexandrine Martin (CNRS / École pratique des hautes études), whose fieldwork in Cambodia culminated in a 1975 chapter based on observations made in 1973 — the last systematic documentation before the Khmer Rouge period destroyed much of Cambodia's traditional knowledge infrastructure.[1] Martin's earlier monograph, Introduction à l'ethnobotanique du Cambodge (CNRS, 1971), provides broader botanical context.[15]

Martin documented cannabis as a familiar domestic crop: "not intensively farmed but the plant could frequently be found growing in small plots around houses — the largest garden observed containing approximately 70 plants." At market, harvest was bought for 3,000 riel per kilogram and resold at 10 riel per package of 7–8 buds.[1] She identified three categories of traditional use:

Culinary: Cannabis leaves and flowers were used extensively as food. "Fresh, they are condiments for curry or vegetables to accompany vermicelli soup; they are eaten as vegetables in the form of fritters with fish paste." Cannabis soup (sngao) was common, "especially chicken soup flavoured with roasted kancha leaves." Cannabis was also added to Chinese soup "in order to induce clients to return."[1] A Khmer journalist confirmed in 1998 that "some people have the custom of eating it in chicken soup in the morning,"[3] and market vendors in 1995 reported that "even cooks in restaurants come to buy it to add to their noodle soup."[2] Cannabis-flavoured dishes persisted well into the prohibition era through the "happy pizza" phenomenon in tourist-oriented restaurants.

Medicinal: Martin recorded cannabis in Traditional Khmer Medicine for treating a wide range of ailments including pain relief, facilitating contractions during difficult childbirths, and remedies for cholera, malaria, dysentery, anorexia, loss of memory, asthma, coughing, dizziness, convulsions, intestinal parasites, and paralysis.[1] In Phnom Penh's markets through the 1990s, cannabis was sold at traditional medicine stalls alongside animal skins, herbs, barks, and other remedies — part of the established pharmacopoeia rather than a distinct drug trade.[3]

Social: Smoking was described as a "group pleasure" used to increase endurance for "difficult tasks," consumed in water pipes or wrapped in paper, corn, or banana leaves.[1] A Khmer journalist explained in 1998 that "old men smoke it, and young people see it as an 'old man's habit.'"[3]

Martin notably observed that unlike in other Southeast Asian countries, hemp fibres were not used for textiles in Cambodia — use was exclusively culinary, medicinal, and social.[1]

Most ancient Khmer medical manuscripts (sastra), inscribed on palm leaves, were destroyed during the Khmer Rouge period (1975–1979), when traditional healers were systematically targeted and eliminated. The National Center for Traditional Medicine (NCTM), established in 2010, has undertaken some reconstruction of surviving knowledge.[16]

Post-Khmer Rouge Reconstruction (1980–1991)

The earliest documented evidence of large-scale cannabis cultivation comes from the post-Khmer Rouge period. An academic Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment of Koh Kong and Kampot provinces documented cannabis at two coastal communities:[17]

  • At Koh Kapik commune on the Thai border, cannabis was "widely grown from 1980 to 1985" before a 1990s crackdown.
  • At Koh Sralao, mountain forest was cut from 1980 to 1990 specifically to plant "Indian Hemp (Cannabis indica)" — a practice driven by conflict refugees from other provinces who "moved to Koh Sralao motivated by personal safety" during ongoing civil war.

Cannabis cultivation and timber selling at Koh Sralao ended in 1991 when a ban was introduced and the Ministry of Environment declared the area protected.[17] This represents the only academic botanical identification in the Cambodian record, classifying the cultivated plant as Cannabis indica.

The Thai Investment Era (1992–2002)

As Cambodia opened to foreign engagement through the UNTAC period (1992–1993), commercial cannabis cultivation expanded dramatically, fuelled by Thai capital.

In 1996, Phnom Penh anti-drug officer Heng Po identified the investment pattern on camera for Associated Press Television: "They grow it because Thai businessmen came here and gave them money to do it. Especially in Kandal, Koh Kong, and Kampot provinces. They give them money and irrigation machines."[18] The APTV footage documented open cannabis fields on "New Island" just outside Phnom Penh on the Mekong River, with irrigation pipes running through banana-intercropped plots. A farmer named Chhe Sambatt, who had been growing for three years, told the camera: "A few years ago no one ever came. It's only this year that they started, so usually I have nothing to fear."[18]

Koh Kong province became the epicentre of commercial production. A 2002 Reuters report described the province as Cambodia's "Wild West" and "a production zone for some of Asia's finest quality marijuana, grown in staggering quantities."[19] Drug lords provided farmers with "tools, seeds and fertilizer to grow cannabis in big jungle plantations" and bought the crop back at harvest.[19] The province had been virtually isolated since the Khmer Rouge cut its roads in the 1970s, accessible only by boat until a bridge to Thailand's Trat province opened in April 2002.

A two-tier quality system existed: poorly cured bulk cannabis ("hay") sold domestically for as little as US$2–4 per kilogram, while superior export-grade product was channelled through the port cities of Sihanoukville and Koh Kong to international markets.[3] In 1999, national enforcement under Police Director General Hok Lundy yielded the destruction of 25 marijuana plantations and 1,200 kg of processed cannabis in Koh Kong province alone, alongside over 4 tonnes confiscated in Sihanoukville.[20]

A 2002 Cambodia Daily investigation confirmed the scale: "Worldwide busts have fingered Cambodia's massive cannabis exports, but heroin hauls are much less common."[21]

Geographic Shift to Kirivong (2000s–present)

As enforcement pressure and new road infrastructure reduced Koh Kong's viability as a production zone in the early 2000s, the centre of gravity for cannabis cultivation shifted southeast to Kirivong district in Takeo province, near the Vietnamese border.

Main article: Kirivong Green Triangle

The Bayong Kor mountain range spans four communes in Kirivong district — Preah Bat Choan Chum, Prey Ampok, Som, and Kiri Chung Koh — and is described in police reports as "ideal for growing marijuana and smuggling to Vietnam."[22] Kirivong district police chief Yuk Sarath confirmed in 2017 that "villagers in this commune have grown such plants in their own field for family use, and also for illegal sale to Vietnam and Phnom Penh."[23]

Takeo provincial police chief Chheang Phannara stated in December 2021 that growing marijuana in Preah Bat Choan Chum commune "is not a new practice and it has been going on for many generations," attributing its persistence to the local authorities' "lack of will to implement the law."[5] Commune police chief In Vuth provided the clearest documentation of the local economy: dried marijuana leaves sell for 140,000–160,000 riel (US$35–40) per kilogram to Vietnamese traders who come to the commune to buy directly.[5]

The scale of Kirivong cultivation is significant. In the first half of 2017 alone, district police destroyed 134,886 marijuana plants and confiscated 272 kg of dried marijuana.[23] A single operation on 1 February 2020 destroyed 180,367 plants across 24 locations. Between 2019 and mid-2021, police documented 97 operations, burned crops at 443 locations, destroyed 282 water reservoirs, and confiscated 80.5 kg of dried marijuana across a total cultivated area of 60.97 hectares.[22]

Cultivation is characterised by dispersed small plots on remote mountain slopes, concealed through intercropping with cassava, cashew, sesame, and forest trees. Sophisticated irrigation systems including wells, ponds, and piped water supply the plots. Growers typically flee before police arrive — cultivators "live in the forest" during the growing season — and replant elsewhere after each raid in what officials describe as a persistent "whack-a-mole" pattern.[24]

Dispersed Cultivation Elsewhere

While Kirivong dominates modern enforcement statistics, cannabis cultivation has been documented across multiple provinces and is often characterised by distinct local patterns.

In Battambang province, small-scale cultivation in lowland agricultural areas follows an "educate and release" enforcement pattern, with growers citing personal, medicinal, or family use. A 36-year-old man arrested in 2015 with 236 plants said he "grew the plants to use himself and to help treat someone in his family."[25]

The Cardamom Mountains corridor spanning Pursat, Kampong Speu, and Kampot harbours remote cultivation in deep mountain forests. In 2015, 7,637 plants were found hidden among sesame crops across rented land in Pursat's Phnom Kravanh district; the farmer had brought the plants from Kandal province.[26]

A notable pattern of cultivation expertise export has been documented: in 2021, a man from Takeo province established a 7,000-plant operation on Bunong indigenous land in Mondulkiri province, deceiving local landowners who "saw plants they had never seen before" into growing cannabis among their vegetables.[27] Similarly, the 2015 Pursat operation involved plants sourced from Kandal province.[26] These cases suggest established growing zones serve as sources of agricultural knowledge that radiate outward as local enforcement pressure increases.

International Context

Cambodia's cannabis prohibition is inseparable from the geopolitics of American drug policy. Nate Thayer's November 1995 investigation for the Far Eastern Economic Review titled: "Medellin on the Mekong" framed Cambodia as an emerging narco-state, primarily over heroin transit.[28] President Clinton's February 1996 letter adding Cambodia to the US drug country list likewise focused on heroin, not cannabis — yet the resulting diplomatic pressure drove the December 1996 criminalisation of a traditional crop that had no measurable impact on the United States.[4] Cannabis was, in effect, collateral damage in a law designed to address international heroin trafficking.

The irony was noted by a 2002 Cambodia Daily investigation, which observed that "worldwide busts have fingered Cambodia's massive cannabis exports" while heroin hauls remained rare and largely unsubstantiated — the opposite of the Clinton letter's framing.[21] The US government knew of narcotics-related corruption "in government and business circles,"[4] yet pressured the same corrupt government to enforce prohibition, creating a system where powerful traffickers were protected while small farmers bore the enforcement burden. The 1998 INCSR confirmed Cambodia was not yet a party to any of the three major UN drug conventions, even as it was being pressed to enforce them.[10]

A 2015 seizure of 1,400 kg of dried marijuana in Phnom Penh revealed that the cannabis "was not planted in Cambodia; it is imported from Laos,"[29] demonstrating that Cambodia functions as both a producer and a transit/processing point for regional cannabis trade. Industrial drying and packing machines were seized alongside the marijuana, indicating sophisticated processing infrastructure.

Demographics & Culture

The Generational Divide

Cannabis use in Cambodia has historically been stratified by generation. A 2004 academic study of drug use in three villages on the outskirts of Battambang town found that among 30 young drug users surveyed (ages 15–25), every single one used amphetamines (yaba) as their primary drug, not one used cannabis.[30] Young Cambodians viewed cannabis as an "old man's habit" and gravitated instead toward amphetamine-type stimulants associated with modernity and Thai media culture.[3][30]

This pattern persists in the modern enforcement record. Officials in Kirivong consistently report that local growers "do not use locally" and that production is entirely for export.[5] Deputy provincial governor Khan Sokha stated in 2021 that "people in Kirivong district have never used marijuana."

Economic Drivers

Cannabis cultivation in Cambodia is driven by rural poverty and the absence of viable alternatives. The crop requires minimal inputs and traditional Mekong corridor cultivation involved simply scattering seeds, allowing the plants to grow unattended[3] while prohibition-era cultivation typically demands more sophisticated infrastructure including irrigation wells, ponds and water tanks.

Cannabis Price History
Year Price Seller Location Type Source
1973 3,000 riel/kg Farmgate Household gardens Landrace Martin[1]
1996 US$2/kg Farmgate Mekong corridor Landrace APTV[18]
1995 US$4/kg Market retail Phnom Penh Landrace PPPost[2]
1998 US$20/kg Market retail Phnom Penh Landrace Gilboa[3]
2021 US$35–40/kg Farmgate Kirivong Landrace PPPost[5]
2026 US$500–600/kg Market Wholesale Kampot Landrace Zomia Collective[31]
2026 US$0.1–1/g Market Retail Kampot Landrace Zomia Collective[31]

The tenfold increase in farmgate price from the pre-prohibition era to the modern enforcement period illustrates the economic incentive structure created by criminalisation. As commune police chief In Vuth noted, "most people in the commune have grown marijuana on their plantations in the village because of the high market price it fetches."[5]

Supply Chain

The modern Kirivong supply chain operates as follows:

  1. Mountain cultivation by villagers, often hired by brokers [citation needed]
  2. Drying and processing[citation needed]
  3. Sale to traders who travel to the commune to buy directly at the farm[5]
  4. Cross-border transport to Vietnam, with secondary domestic distribution to Kampot, Sihanoukville, Phnom Penh [citation needed]

Trafficking is conducted by motorbike runners carrying loads of approximately 13 kg per trip[citation needed]. One arrested trafficker in 2018 was on her third trip transporting marijuana toward the Vietnamese border[citation needed].

Enforcement & Threats

Active Campaigns

Cambodia conducts annual eradication campaigns primarily targeting Kirivong district, with operations typically intensifying in the early months of each year coinciding with the dry-season growing cycle[citation needed]. The National Authority for Combating Drugs (NACD), established in 1995, coordinates national drug control efforts. [citation needed]

See the latest news on eradication campaigns here.

Enforcement Challenges

Enforcement in the Bayong Kor mountains is constrained by remote, rugged terrain requiring treks of 5 km or more. Commune police chief In Savuth described the tracking methods: "We looked for signs in the forest, footprints and traces of people walking on the rocks."[22] Cultivators typically flee before police arrive and villagers refuse to identify plot owners. Undercover agents sometimes pose as honey hunters or wildlife foragers to locate farms[citation needed].

A persistent "whack-a-mole" dynamic characterises enforcement: "When we crack down on marijuana plants in the west, growers secretly plant them in the east because this area is on the Cambodian-Vietnamese border. They are opportunists, but we will continue our clampdowns."[24]

Recent News

... further results

Growing Regions

No growing regions documented yet.

Growing Areas

No growing areas documented yet.

Conservation Status

Cambodia's traditional cannabis landraces face severe and ongoing threats from multiple vectors:

  • Eradication campaigns : Annual destruction of tens of thousands of plants and associated infrastructure eliminates cultivated populations and disrupts seed saving
  • Genetic contamination : No documentation of modern hybrid introduction, but commercial pressure may favour higher-yielding imported genetics over traditional varieties
  • Cultural disruption : The criminalisation of a multi-generational agricultural practice severs the transmission of traditional cultivation knowledge
  • Habitat loss : Shifting cultivation patterns under enforcement pressure fragment populations into increasingly remote and marginal sites
  • Knowledge destruction : The Khmer Rouge's systematic elimination of traditional healers and destruction of palm-leaf medical manuscripts (sastra) [citation needed]

The traditional riverine cultivation described in the 1990s — where farmers "scattered the seeds and let it grow" along the Mekong[3] — appears to have been entirely eliminated. Modern cultivation is confined to hidden and remote plots with artificial irrigation, representing a fundamental change in the plant's growing environment and the selection pressures acting on it.

No systematic botanical collection or characterisation of Cambodian cannabis landraces has been conducted. The single academic botanical identification in the record classifies the Koh Kong cultivar as Cannabis indica.[17]

Conservation status: Endangered - Active eradication, no known preservation efforts, traditional cultivation knowledge under threat.[citation needed]

See Also

Bibliography

The following works constitute the essential academic bibliography for cannabis in Cambodia. Items marked * are the highest-priority sources for further research.

  • * Martin, Marie Alexandrine. "Ethnobotanical Aspects of Cannabis in Southeast Asia." In Vera Rubin (ed.), Cannabis and Culture. Berlin/New York: De Gruyter Mouton, 1975, pp. 63–76. — The foundational source; 14-page chapter based on 1973 fieldwork documenting culinary, medicinal, and social use.
  • * Martin, Marie Alexandrine. Introduction à l'ethnobotanique du Cambodge. Paris: Éditions du CNRS (CEDRASEMI), 1971, 257 pp. — Doctoral thesis; digitised on Gallica BnF (ark:/12148/bpt6k3339777w). Broader botanical inventory likely containing detailed cannabis entries.
  • * Dy Phon, Pauline. Plants Used in Cambodia / Plantes utilisées au Cambodge. Phnom Penh, 2000, 915 pp. — Trilingual Khmer-English-French botanical dictionary; held in 13 major libraries worldwide. Not digitised.
  • * Law on Drug Control (Cambodia). English translation available at cdc.gov.kh. Khmer version is the official text.
  • Clarke, Robert C. and Mark D. Merlin. Cannabis: Evolution and Ethnobotany. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013, 434 pp. — Global synthesis including Southeast Asian traditions.
  • Descours-Gatin, Chantal. Quand l'opium finançait la colonisation en Indochine: L'élaboration de la régie générale de l'opium (1860–1914). Paris: L'Harmattan, 1992. — Definitive study of the French colonial opium monopoly.
  • Oppenheimer, Edna. A Rapid Assessment of Drug Abuse in Cambodia. World Bank / Cambodian Researchers for Development, 1995. — One of the few academic assessments bridging the post-KR documentation void.
  • Petelot, A. Les plantes médicinales du Cambodge, du Laos et du Vietnam. 4 vols., 1952–1954. — Major French colonial pharmaceutical inventory for Indochina.
  • Thayer, Nate. "Cambodia: Asia's New Narco-State? Medellin on the Mekong." Far Eastern Economic Review, 23 November 1995. — Landmark investigation that shaped the international narrative leading to the 1996 law.

Archival Leads

  • Archives nationales d'outre-mer (ANOM), Aix-en-Provence: Catalogue entry "Chanvre indien, cannabis, kif, interdiction: arrêtés" (ark:/61561/dk989jdkls) — colonial administrative orders on Indian hemp; geographic scope unverified; physical consultation required.
  • Bulletin administratif du Cambodge: 47 years digitised on Gallica (BnF). Systematic OCR search for "chanvre," "cannabis," "kancha," and "stupéfiant" has never been conducted.
  • UNTAC Radio Archives, University of Wisconsin-Madison: 2,462 documents, 2,113 tapes in Khmer/English/French. Unexplored for drug policy content from 1992–1993.

References