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Georgia (country)

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Georgia (country)
საქართველო (Sakartvelo)
Lake Grdzeli, Lagodekhi Protected Area
Lake Grdzeli, Lagodekhi Protected Area
Capital Tbilisi
Continent Asia
Subregion West Asia
Cannabis Status
Legal Status Private adult consumption not punishable; possession over 5 g a crime
Status Since 2025
Enforcement Cultivation, sale and possession above the small amount prosecuted
Documentation
Growing Regions 0
Growing Areas 0
Accessions 3


Georgia is a country of the South Caucasus, between the Greater Caucasus and the Lesser Caucasus. Hemp was among the field crops of the Tiflis and Kutais governorates of the Russian Empire,[1][2] and the Georgian Encyclopedia counts both the common and the wild plant among the country's flora.[3] Cannabis is grown there on a small scale for personal use.[4]: 10

Between 2015 and 2018 the Constitutional Court of Georgia struck down imprisonment for buying and keeping up to 70 grams of dried marijuana for personal use, and then the criminal and administrative punishment of consuming it; consumption in private is not punishable.[5][6] Amendments to the Criminal Code adopted in July 2025 made the purchase or keeping of more than 5 grams of dried marijuana punishable by up to six years in prison.[7][8]

Geography

Digitised herbarium sheet with a large, densely leafy, branched cannabis top laid on the diagonal, an empty paper envelope at the right and a printed label completed by hand at the lower right.
Hryniewiecki s.n., gathered in a grassy field near Chalaubani in Kakheti on 30 July 1900.

The Georgian Encyclopedia names common hemp (C. sativa), Indian hemp (C. indica) and wild hemp (C. ruderalis), and says that the common and the wild kinds occur naturally in Georgia.[3] The Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research at Gatersleben holds seed of Cannabis sativa subsp. spontanea from a cattle pen about 5 km south of Shatili in Khevsureti, at about 1,400 metres in the Dusheti district.[9][10] A plant of the genus was collected on 31 August 1998 at Azechi, about 7 km east of Shatili, in oak forest and meadows used for hay, grazing and crops.[11]

In the east, B. Hryniewiecki gathered Cannabis sativa in a grassy field near Chalaubani in Kakheti in 1900.[12] In 2014 a plant named Cannabis ruderalis was collected in a garden in the village of Lakhamula in Svaneti.[13] The Ministry of Internal Affairs destroyed some 28.373 tonnes of wild hemp in 2014 in Samtskhe–Javakheti, Mtskheta-Mtianeti, Kvemo Kartli, Shida Kartli, Adjara, Imereti, Racha-Lechkhumi and Lower Svaneti.[14]

Alphonse de Candolle, writing in 1882, reported that authors placed hemp to the south of the Caucasus, but judged its wild status there less certain than south of the Caspian, since the region was populous and hemp seed spreads easily from gardens.[15]

Agriculture

Wheat filled 60 per cent of the sown land of the Tiflis governorate, which grew hemp among its field crops with barley, rye, millet, tobacco, peas, potatoes, cotton and maize.[1] In the Kutais governorate of western Georgia maize took 81.3 per cent of the sown area; hemp fell within the remaining 0.7 per cent with oats, spelt, potatoes, peas, flax, rice and tobacco.[2] The Granat encyclopaedia says that hemp was sown there in small quantity.[16]

The plant's Georgian name is კანაფი (kanapi). Its fibre was twisted into rope and woven into cloth, its seed was pressed for oil, and it was used as a spice, above all in Svaneti.[3] Maia Akhalkatsi and colleagues list Cannabis sativa (kanafi) among the traditional crops of Georgia, its fibre made into cord and thread for sacks and its seed into oil; they add that its seed was mixed with wheat flour for bread. They also list C. sativa among the wild relatives of the country's crops.[17]: 62, 69

The law on narcotic drugs of 2012 forbids sowing, growing or cultivating plants that contain a substance under special control.[18] In September 2018 the Ministry of Internal Affairs put forward a bill on the cultivation of cannabis for medical use and export. After criticism from the public and the Georgian Orthodox Church, the government shelved it within days, and on 2 November 2018 the speaker of parliament, Irakli Kobakhidze, announced its withdrawal.[19]

Cannabis in Georgia

The law calls the whole plant of any species of Cannabis the hemp plant, and calls its tops with leaves, flowers and fruit cannabis, unless resin has been extracted from them.[18] The criminal law deals in the cannabis plant and marijuana (მარიხუანა), dried or raw.[20][21]

History

The Brockhaus and Efron encyclopaedia counts hemp, with flax, wax, resin and honey, among the natural products of ancient Colchis, in western Georgia.[22]

Under the Russian Empire

Digitised herbarium sheet with a single leafy cannabis top with dark palmate leaves, and two small labels, one stamped and one handwritten, at the lower right.
Anon. s.n., gathered in the environs of Tiflis, today's Tbilisi, in May 1883.

A sheet of cannabis in the Moscow University Herbarium dated 22 August 1871 has a label reading "ravines, behind the garden"; the herbarium files it under Georgia and attributes it to Sitovskiy.[23] An anonymous collector gathered a leafy top near a railway line in the environs of Tiflis, today's Tbilisi, in May 1883.[24] Hryniewiecki's sheet of 1900, from Kakheti, came to Moscow from the herbarium of Countess E. P. Sheremeteva.[12]

Soviet Georgia (1921–1991)

The sociologist Anzor Gabiani, who headed the Caucasian branch of the All-Union research institute of the Soviet interior ministry, surveyed drug users in Georgia for 18 years and concluded that hidden users outnumbered those known to the authorities by 10 or 12 to one.[25] In his survey of 1,620 addicts and users in 1984–1985, the drugs of the hemp plant came first and morphine second. Set beside his survey of 1967–1974, it showed users better educated, less poor and more often women.[25] His books on drug use were published in Tbilisi in 1977 and 1988 and in Moscow in 1990.[26] In 1989 the Transcaucasian republics together had a combined drug and toxic addiction rate of 15.1 per 100,000 people, against 25.6 for the whole Soviet Union.[25]

Independent Georgia (since 1991)

Georgia acceded to the Convention on Psychotropic Substances and to the convention of 1988 against illicit traffic on 8 January 1998, and to the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs as amended in 1972 on 27 March 2000.[27][28][29] The Criminal Code dates from 22 July 1999 and the law on narcotic drugs from 22 May 2012.[20][18]

On 24 October 2015 the Constitutional Court held that imprisonment of seven to 15 years for buying and keeping dried marijuana for personal use, in the quantity at issue (up to 70 grams), was inhuman and cruel punishment.[5][30] The court said that its decision did not decriminalise marijuana and did not reach possession for sale.[30] In July 2017 parliament removed imprisonment as a penalty for up to 70 grams.[4]: 10 On 14 July 2017 the court held that imprisonment for sowing and growing 63.73 and 150.72 grams of cannabis for personal consumption was manifestly disproportionate; for 265.49 grams it upheld imprisonment, given the risk of distribution, but found a term of six to 12 years manifestly disproportionate.[31]

On 30 November 2017, in a case brought by Givi Shanidze with lawyers from the Girchi party, the court struck down the criminal liability that the code laid on repeated consumption of marijuana "in a blanket manner and without any exceptions".[32][33] On 30 July 2018, in Batumi, it annulled the administrative punishment for using marijuana. Restrictions remained justified in schools and other places for minors, in educational establishments, the army, medical and public premises, and places such as public transport; consumption "in private, personal space" for recreation could not be punished.[6] The White Noise movement protested outside parliament for decriminalisation on 10 December 2016,[34] and Girchi planned a mass planting of cannabis at midnight on 31 December 2016.[35]

In April 2025 parliament adopted a package of amendments raising the penalties for possessing, using and selling drugs and making it a crime to refuse a drug test ordered by the police.[36]: 102 On 2 July 2025 it adopted amendments that placed possession of marijuana and the cannabis plant in the same category as that of other drugs, leaving the rules on consumption unchanged. The committee chair, Archil Gorduladze, presented them as an answer to the court's rulings, which he said had led to the widespread use of drugs.[8][7] On 24 June 2026 the court held that imprisonment for buying and keeping 0.1315 grams of cannabis resin for personal use was unconstitutional, even for a person with a previous drug conviction; making the act a crime was not, since distribution could not be excluded.[37]

Cultivation

Local production of drugs is limited to small-scale cultivation of cannabis, and home production of opioids and amphetamine-type stimulants, for personal use.[4]: 10 In an online survey of 218 Georgian cannabis growers between December 2020 and August 2021, 193 grew it for their own use.[38] In June 2025 police seized 136 plants from greenhouses in a rented house near Lake Bazaleti.[39] In April 2025 the Mtskheta-Mtianeti police seized 13 plants from a greenhouse equipped for growing them, with a large amount of narcotics prepared for sale.[40]

Preparations and consumption

The narcotic substance, called კანაბისი (kanabisi), is obtained from the leaves and the flowering and fruiting shoots of the plant.[3] In the first household survey of drug use in Georgia, of residents aged 18 to 64, 17.3 per cent said they had tried cannabis; a randomised-response method gave 29.9 per cent.[41] In the general-population survey of 2015, with 4,805 respondents, an estimated 15 to 16 per cent had tried cannabis and 1.2 per cent had used it in the past month.[4]: 3 Among adults aged 18 to 29, lifetime use was 17.3 per cent in 2015 and 18.1 per cent in 2022.[42] Of the growers surveyed in 2020–2021, 68 per cent used cannabis for recreation and 32 per cent for medical purposes.[38]

Trade and commerce

The national drug report describes Georgia as not a major drug-producing country.[4]: 10 The bill of 2018 had two parts, one ending punishment for consuming cannabis at home and one regulating its cultivation for export;[43] the cannabis would have been grown for pharmaceutical and cosmetic exports, while those uses stayed illegal at home.[44] Of the 34 controlled substances seized in 2017, cannabis products made up the largest volume: 115 kg of cannabis plant and 48 kg of marijuana.[4]: 10

The narcotics law sets the small amount of dried marijuana at up to 5 grams (10 grams raw) and of the cannabis plant at up to 10 grams. Above that, up to 70 grams of dried marijuana and 155 grams of the plant, is the starting amount for criminal liability; up to 250 and 750 grams is large, and anything more is particularly large.[18] Buying, keeping, carrying or sending the cannabis plant or marijuana in a small amount is fined 500 lari, and use by a person under 18 is fined 500 to 1,000 lari.[21] Above the small amount, buying or keeping is punished by up to six years in prison.[20][7] The criminal code does not treat consumption of the cannabis plant or marijuana as illegal consumption.[20]

Growing a small amount is an administrative offence, fined 500 to 5,000 lari with confiscation, or punished by up to 60 days' detention.[21] Above it, illegal sowing, growing or cultivation of the cannabis plant carries a fine, community service, house arrest or two to six years' imprisonment.[20] Sale of the cannabis plant or marijuana carries five to ten years, and handing it on without gain three to eight years.[20]

Enforcement

The Ministry of Internal Affairs prosecutes cultivation under the criminal code; it called the 136 plants of June 2025 an especially large amount.[39] It destroys wild hemp in operations across several regions.[14] The national drug report for 2016–2017 described police powers to stop people in the street and compel a drug test where there were sufficient grounds, and to detain those who refused for up to 12 hours.[4]: 10

Growing Regions

Landrace cannabis growing regions currently documented on the wiki: No growing regions documented yet.

Growing Areas

Landrace cannabis growing areas currently documented on the wiki: No growing areas documented yet.

Accessions

Accession IDNamePriorityCollectedArea
Anon. s.n., Tbilisi (1883)Anonymous herbarium specimen, environs of Tbilisi, Georgia (1883)
Hryniewiecki s.n., Chalaubani (1900)Hryniewiecki herbarium specimen, near Chalaubani, Kakheti, Georgia (1900)
Sitovskiy s.n. (1871)Herbarium specimen attributed to Sitovskiy, ravines behind a garden, Georgia (1871)

Conservation status

The Gatersleben seed of subsp. spontanea from Khevsureti was collected before 1987 and regenerated in 2004, and a duplicate is held in the Svalbard Global Seed Vault.[10][45] The institute sent a sample to the United States National Plant Germplasm System in May 2023, where it is held as G 33598 and is not available for distribution.[10] Akhalkatsi and colleagues include C. sativa in their list of the wild relatives of Georgia's ancient crops, in a study of the genetic erosion of those crops.[17]: 69 Herbarium sheets from 1871, 1883 and 1900 are held in Moscow.[23][24][12]

Recent news

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See also

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 "Тифлисская губерния". Энциклопедический словарь Брокгауза и Ефрона (in русский). Vol. 33. St Petersburg: F. A. Brockhaus and I. A. Efron. 1901. pp. 261–267. Retrieved 14 October 2026 – via Wikisource.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 "Кутаисская губерния". Энциклопедический словарь Брокгауза и Ефрона (in русский). Vol. 17. St Petersburg: F. A. Brockhaus and I. A. Efron. 1896. pp. 129–135. Retrieved 14 October 2026 – via Wikisource.
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 "კანაფი". ქართული ენციკლოპედია (in ქართული). Georgian National Academy of Sciences. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  4. ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4 4.5 4.6 Mgebrishvili, Tamar; Otiashvili, David (2018). Drug Situation in Georgia 2017: Executive Summary (PDF) (Report). Tbilisi: Alternative Georgia. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Constitutional Court of Georgia (24 October 2015). "Citizen of Georgia Beka Tsikarishvili v. the Parliament of Georgia". Judgment N1/4/592. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  6. ↑ 6.0 6.1 Constitutional Court of Georgia (30 July 2018). "Citizens of Georgia – Zurab Japaridze and Vakhtang Megrelishvili v. the Parliament of Georgia" (PDF). Batumi. Judgment N1/3/1282. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 7.2 Parliament of Georgia (1 July 2025). "The Parliament adopted the Draft Criminal Code for the I reading" (Press release). Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 "Georgian Dream Criminalizes Small Marijuana Possession". Civil.ge. 2 July 2025. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  9. ↑ "Occurrence 120968587: Cannabis sativa subsp. spontanea (Czern.) Serebr. ex Serebr. & Sizova". GBIF. Global Biodiversity Information Facility. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 "G 33598, Cannabis sativa subsp. spontanea". GRIN-Global. USDA Agricultural Research Service, National Plant Germplasm System. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  11. ↑ "Occurrence 4061672015: Cannabis L." GBIF. Global Biodiversity Information Facility. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  12. ↑ 12.0 12.1 12.2 "Specimen MW0661549: Cannabis sativa L." Moscow Digital Herbarium. Moscow State University. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  13. ↑ "Occurrence 1258071828: Cannabis ruderalis Janisch". GBIF. Global Biodiversity Information Facility. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  14. ↑ 14.0 14.1 Kirtzkhalia, Nana (31 July 2014). "Georgia's Interior Ministry conducts operation to destroy wild hemp". Trend. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  15. ↑ de Candolle, Alphonse. Origin of Cultivated Plants. Retrieved 14 October 2026 – via Project Gutenberg.
  16. ↑ "Кутаисская губерния". Энциклопедический словарь Гранат (in русский). Retrieved 14 October 2026 – via Wikisource.
  17. ↑ 17.0 17.1 Akhalkatsi, Maia; Ekhvaia, Jana; Asanidze, Zezva (2012). "Diversity and Genetic Erosion of Ancient Crops and Wild Relatives of Agricultural Cultivars for Food: Implications for Nature Conservation in Georgia (Caucasus)". In Tiefenbacher, John (ed.). Perspectives on Nature Conservation: Patterns, Pressures and Prospects. Rijeka: InTech. doi:10.5772/30286. ISBN 978-953-51-0033-1.
  18. ↑ 18.0 18.1 18.2 18.3 On Narcotic Drugs, Psychotropic Substances and Precursors, and Narcological Assistance(Law of Georgia No. 6245-Iს), 22 May 2012, art. 15(4)(f) and Annex 2, consolidated text to 14 April 2026.Georgia.Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  19. ↑ "Government to Withdraw Cannabis Cultivation Bill". Civil.ge. 2 November 2018. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 20.2 20.3 20.4 20.5 Criminal Code of Georgia(No. 2287), 22 July 1999, arts 260, 260², 260³, 265¹ and 273, consolidated text to 25 June 2026.Georgia.Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  21. ↑ 21.0 21.1 21.2 საქართველოს ადმინისტრაციულ სამართალდარღვევათა კოდექსი(No. 161), 15 December 1984, arts 45, 45¹ and 100², consolidated text after the laws of 16 April and 2 July 2025.Georgia.Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  22. ↑ "Грузия". Энциклопедический словарь Брокгауза и Ефрона (in русский). Vol. 9a. St Petersburg: F. A. Brockhaus and I. A. Efron. 1893. pp. 795–801. Retrieved 14 October 2026 – via Wikisource.
  23. ↑ 23.0 23.1 "Specimen MW0661550: Cannabis sativa L." Moscow Digital Herbarium. Moscow State University. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  24. ↑ 24.0 24.1 "Specimen MW0661551: Cannabis sativa L." Moscow Digital Herbarium. Moscow State University. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  25. ↑ 25.0 25.1 25.2 Lee, Rensselaer (1991). Dynamics of the Soviet Illicit Drug Market (PDF) (Report). Occasional Paper. Washington, D.C.: Kennan Institute for Advanced Russian Studies, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  26. ↑ "გაბიანი ანზორ ალექსანდრეს ძე". ქართული ენციკლოპედია (in ქართული). Georgian National Academy of Sciences. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  27. ↑ "Convention on Psychotropic Substances". United Nations Treaty Collection. Chapter VI, 16. Retrieved 3 October 2026.
  28. ↑ "United Nations Convention against Illicit Traffic in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances". United Nations Treaty Collection. Chapter VI, 19. Retrieved 3 October 2026.
  29. ↑ "Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961, as amended by the Protocol amending the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961: status". United Nations Treaty Collection. United Nations. Retrieved 3 October 2026.
  30. ↑ 30.0 30.1 "Constitutional Court Bans Imprisonment for Personal Use of Marijuana". Civil Georgia. Tbilisi. 25 October 2015. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  31. ↑ Constitutional Court of Georgia (14 July 2017). "Jambul Gvianidze, Davit Khomeriki and Lasha Gagishvili v. the Parliament of Georgia". Judgment N1/9/701,722,725. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  32. ↑ Constitutional Court of Georgia (30 November 2017). "Givi Shanidze v. the Parliament of Georgia". Judgment N1/13/732. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  33. ↑ "Court decriminalises cannabis consumption in Georgia". OC Media. 30 November 2017. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  34. ↑ Papalashvili, Tamar (15 December 2016). "Fighting back against Georgia's war on drugs". openDemocracy. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  35. ↑ Lomsadze, Giorgi (23 December 2016). "Georgia: Mass Marijuana-Planting Party Planned for New Year's". Eurasianet. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  36. ↑ International Narcotics Control Board (2026). Report of the International Narcotics Control Board for 2025 (PDF) (Report). Vienna: United Nations. ISBN 978-92-1-154655-2. E/INCB/2025/1. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  37. ↑ Constitutional Court of Georgia (24 June 2026). "The First Board of the Constitutional Court of Georgia rules to partially uphold Constitutional Claim №882". Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  38. ↑ 38.0 38.1 Mgebrishvili, Tamar; Kirtadze, Irma; Mirzazadeh, Ali; Otiashvili, David (2026). "Cannabis Dependence Among Georgian Small-Scale Cannabis Growers: Results of a Cross-Sectional Online Survey". Journal of Psychoactive Drugs. 58 (3): 361–370. doi:10.1080/02791072.2025.2463514. PMID 39918885.
  39. ↑ 39.0 39.1 Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia (27 June 2025). "Police seized an especially large amount of cannabis plants" (Press release). Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  40. ↑ Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia (12 April 2025). "Mtskheta-Mtianeti Police Seized a Large Amount of Marijuana and Cannabis" (Press release). Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  41. ↑ Kirtadze, Irma; Otiashvili, David; Tabatadze, Mzia; Vardanashvili, Irina; Sturua, Lela; Zabransky, Tomas; Anthony, James C. (2018). "Republic of Georgia estimates for prevalence of drug use: Randomized response techniques suggest under-estimation". Drug and Alcohol Dependence. 187: 300–304. doi:10.1016/j.drugalcdep.2018.03.019. PMID 29704851.
  42. ↑ Nadareishvili, Ilia; Rao, Sowmya R.; Otiashvili, David; Gnatienko, Natalia; Samet, Jeffrey H.; Lunze, Karsten; Kirtadze, Irma (2025). "Post-legalization shifts in cannabis use among young adults in Georgia: A nationally representative study". Addiction. 120 (2): 335–346. doi:10.1111/add.16688. PMID 39417804.
  43. ↑ "Georgian officials to withdraw cannabis export bill after meeting Patriarch". OC Media. 2 November 2018. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  44. ↑ Avetisyan, Ani (5 February 2021). "Getting Hye: Armenia to legalise industrial hemp cultivation". OC Media. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
  45. ↑ "Occurrence 5065074864: Cannabis sativa L." GBIF. Global Biodiversity Information Facility. Retrieved 14 October 2026.
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