Lesotho dagga trade
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| From | Lesotho, Maloti Mountains, Mokhotlong |
|---|---|
| By way of | Bloemfontein or Ficksburg or KwaZulu-Natal |
| To | Johannesburg, Highveld, Durban, Botswana, Namibia, Netherlands, United Kingdom, Canada, Germany |
| How it travelled | Overland |
| What moved | Dagga |
|---|---|
| Carried by | Basotho growers selling to South African and Lesotho dealers; Basotho mineworkers, among them the Marashea gangs, from 1947; licensed companies from 2017 |
| Scale | An estimated 70 per cent of the cannabis entering South Africa (UNODC, 2006) |
| Active | 1940s to the present |
|---|---|
| Status | Still in use |
| Legal status | Changed over time |
The Lesotho dagga trade is the movement of cannabis, dagga in South Africa and matekoane in Sesotho, from Lesotho to the mining districts and cities of South Africa, and in smaller amounts beyond them. Lesotho is enclosed by South Africa, and in the late 1990s all the cannabis grown there was exported to it, at least at first.[1]: 17 The historian Craig Paterson dates the smuggling of Lesotho cannabis into the gold-mining districts to the Marashea, gangs of Basotho mineworkers who established themselves there from 1947.[2]: 83–84 Commercial cultivation grew considerably from the mid-1980s,[1]: 12 and in 2006 the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) estimated that 70 per cent of the cannabis entering South Africa was grown in Lesotho.[3]: 160 Most of it went to Johannesburg, the Highveld and Durban, from where some was exported to Europe.[1]: 18[2]: 89 Smuggling dagga was already an offence in Basutoland in the 1930s,[4] and the trade remains illegal; since 2017 Lesotho has licensed companies to grow cannabis for export to medical markets,[5] and in April 2021 one of them was cleared to export cannabis flower to the European Union.[6]
Origins
The colonial administration of Basutoland made the chiefs responsible for eradicating cannabis. Under Proclamations 265 of 1924 and 116 of 1929, the historians Phumla Nkosi, Richard Devey and Thembisa Waetjen write, they were required to rid their areas of commercial dagga.[7] In 1935 the Basutoland police counted 66 prosecutions for dagga smuggling, against 53 the year before.[4] A proclamation of 1951 raised the penalties for trafficking in dagga, and offences of possessing and trafficking in it rose that year from 214 to 383, a rise the administration put down to police patrols by motor vehicle.[8] Representatives of Basutoland and Swaziland sat as observers and advisers on South Africa's Inter-Departmental Committee on the Abuse of Dagga, which reported in 1952 and recommended, among other measures, greater border control.[2]: 55, 58
Paterson places the trade's growth in the migrant labour system. Lesotho, like Swaziland, served the South African economy as a reservoir of mine labour, and the movement of workers to the towns made it easier to carry cannabis there.[2]: 83 The Marashea, also called the Russians, were loosely linked gangs, almost all of them Basotho, who from 1947 grew powerful in South Africa's mining districts through trading cannabis, selling liquor illegally and prostitution. Paterson writes that they smuggled cannabis in from Lesotho, where it "enjoyed widespread tacit acceptance", as they moved to work in the mines.[2]: 83–84 In his account small exports to Europe began in the early 1970s, when South Africans and immigrants bought cannabis from farmers in the former Transkei, Swaziland and Lesotho and sent it mostly to England and the Netherlands.[2]: 73
Growth from the 1980s
Laurent Laniel, who studied the trade in 1997 for UNESCO, followed the historian Stephen Gill in dating a considerable increase in commercial cultivation to the mid-1980s.[1]: 12 He saw it as one of two answers to the shortage of land in Lesotho, the other being emigration to South Africa from 1900; cultivation for export, he thought, probably spread later than emigration.[1]: 11 Julian Bloomer, who did fieldwork in a foothills village from 2005 to 2007, linked commercial cultivation to ecological, economic, social and political pressures over three or four decades, among them the steady fall in miners' remittances from South Africa since the 1980s as Basotho mineworkers were laid off.[9]: 51, 56 During the years of migrant labour, he writes, women commonly controlled the household's income from cannabis, because it could be kept from absent husbands.[9]: 58
Paterson thinks it possible that Lesotho shared in the cannabis boom of the late 1980s and early 1990s and that the growth in its production was partly a result of rising demand in Europe.[2]: 78 In Bloomer's periodisation of the southern African cannabis economy, a third phase began in the early 1990s, with the end of apartheid and the decay of the migrant labour system.[10]: § 4
The route
Laniel described two main routes out of Lesotho in 1997. Second- and third-grade cannabis from the west and centre of the country went west and north towards Bloemfontein and Ficksburg and then on to Johannesburg, mostly by road; he thought it likely that some of it was gathered first in the towns of Maseru and Mafeteng. First-grade cannabis from the eastern districts of Mokhotlong, Thaba-Tseka and Qacha's Nek went to Durban, often carried by porters and donkeys into villages of KwaZulu-Natal.[1]: 17–18 In Durban it was sold on the national market or exported to Europe, mainly to the Netherlands and the United Kingdom and in quantities that were not large, or to North America, often mixed with cannabis grown in KwaZulu-Natal.[1]: 18 Laniel wrote that these routes were used mainly by networks of South African traffickers who supplied the country's urban markets, and that parallel networks supplied Basotho miners working in South Africa; the South African police had found sacks of cannabis in raids on the hostels where those miners lived.[1]: 18
Writing in 2009, Paterson found that some Lesotho cannabis went south towards the Cape but that most of it was sold on the Highveld, above all in the mining areas, while almost all the high-quality cannabis of the region was moved east into Natal for export to Europe from Durban.[2]: 89 Discussions with the South African Police Service, reported in a thesis of 1998 by Manthatisi Moremoholo, put at an average of 70 per cent the share of dagga cases in KwaZulu-Natal brought against Basotho who had crossed into the province to sell it.[11]: 54 In 2013 police in KwaZulu-Natal described a crossing of the mountains from Lesotho into the uKhahlamba-Drakensberg Park as a "known drug route".[12] On the Free State side of the border, Bloomer found that the provincial police named the cannabis trade as their top priority in the eastern Free State.[9]: 60
In the mid-1990s dagga was regularly smuggled into Namibia from Lesotho, South Africa and Swaziland.[13] Citing the United States Department of State, Peter Gastrow of the Institute for Security Studies wrote that most of the 1,268 kilograms of cannabis seized in Botswana in 2002 had been imported by Zimbabwean smugglers or had come from Mozambique and Lesotho.[14] He added that UNODC and the State Department believed that some shipments from Lesotho might be trafficked to Europe.[14] Bloomer judged in 2019 that the extent to which Lesotho cannabis travelled beyond Africa was "almost impossible to determine".[10]: § 6
Goods and traders
The Basotho grade their cannabis themselves, as first, second or third grade.[1]: 9 Growers in the zone of the Mohale dam told Laniel that the buyers were sometimes Basotho but usually Zulu or Xhosa, and that they paid mountain people, usually women, to carry the harvest to the place where it was collected.[1]: 14–15 The unit of sale in the fields was a bag of the kind that normally holds 50 kilograms of maize.[1]: 14 Laniel also found that South African and Lesotho traffickers bought directly from the growers in the mountains, so that the income was spread widely rather than held by a few wholesalers, as in Swaziland.[15] Cannabis was also bartered: livestock was exchanged for it in the mountains and cars in the towns, mainly Maseru.[15] In the southern border districts in 1999, police and villagers told researchers that Basotho sold dagga to South Africans in exchange for guns, a trade they said had greatly increased the number of firearms on the Lesotho side.[16]: 10
The leaves of the male plants, harvested first, were sold separately. Laniel thought it probable that they were sold in South Africa as maajut and smoked with Mandrax in what is called a "white pipe".[15] The UNODC Bulletin on Narcotics of 2006 spelt it majat.[17]: 73 Laniel also recorded seizures of hashish in Lesotho's border districts and at Ermelo in South Africa between 1995 and 1997, reported by the World Customs Organization, and left open whether it was made in Lesotho or imported for re-export.[1]: 15–17 Paterson thought the hashish was made locally, and wrote that from 2003 Lesotho hashish could occasionally be found in South Africa; that year small discs of it were on sale in Johannesburg.[2]: 110–112
Paterson called Lesotho "renowned for its low-quality cannabis", because growers leave the male plants in the field to set seed for the next season.[2]: 89 Gastrow wrote that Lesotho had been a well-known source of high-quality cannabis for South African smokers over many decades.[14] Laniel thought that the top grade was probably marketed and exported from Durban as Durban Poison, notably to the Netherlands,[1]: 9 and the UNODC Bulletin repeated the suggestion that much of what was sold under that name came from Lesotho.[17]: 73 Paterson disagreed: two traders he interviewed remembered "DP" as a way of wrapping cannabis in thin sticks, which became the name Durban Poison around 1974 or 1975, and in his view the name was older in South Africa than its use in Europe.[2]: 74–75
Scale
In 1997 dealers paid 200 to 300 maloti a bag in winter, when most of the crop was sold, and 500 to 600 maloti in January, when almost all of it had gone.[1]: 12–13 In Bloomer's village in 2006 the price for 25 kilograms ranged from 500 maloti before the harvest to 150 during it.[9]: 55 Laniel counted cannabis among Lesotho's three main sources of hard currency, with international aid and miners' wages,[1]: 7 and in the Mohale dam zone the sale of cannabis provided nearly half of households' agricultural income.[1]: 12 In Bloomer's village it gave about 28 per cent of income in the year of his survey.[9]: 54
UNODC's World Drug Report 2006 estimated that 70 per cent of the cannabis entering South Africa was grown in Lesotho.[3]: 160 In the World Drug Report 2011, South Africa assessed that 80 per cent of the cannabis on its territory in 2009 had come from Lesotho and Swaziland together, and that an estimated 30 per cent was destined for Europe.[18]: 196 The International Narcotics Control Board (INCB) ranked Lesotho third among the producers of southern Africa in 2003, after South Africa and Malawi.[19]: para. 263 The seizures Lesotho reported to the United Nations were 15,390 kilograms of cannabis in 1996 and 21,584 kilograms in 1998.[14]
Regulation and enforcement
Laniel found cultivation in 1997 to be "an open secret" that enjoyed "de facto decriminalisation".[15] Bloomer argued from interviews with police, chiefs and politicians that the trade worked as much through the active participation of officials as through their leniency.[9]: 60 In 2000 the INCB noted that Lesotho had set up a division of the police and the national intelligence service to act against drug syndicates.[20]: para. 202 The Board sent its first mission to Lesotho in August 2005 and urged the government to eradicate the crop and to introduce alternative development with the help of donors.[21]: 49 In July 2006 Lesotho police and the police of the Free State, the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal seized more than 47 tons of dagga in a joint operation, the Free State police said;[22] the INCB reported the same figure.[23]: 38 Lesotho's Drugs of Abuse Act of 2008 allows cannabis to be grown only under a licence for medical or scientific purposes.[24]
Licensed export
Lesotho began issuing licences to grow cannabis for medical purposes in 2017.[5] In 2018 its authorities told the INCB that the crop was meant solely for export to countries that allow medical use.[25] In October 2017 the Cape Times reported that a local subsidiary of the South African firm Verve Dynamics had been given the right to grow, make and export cannabis products; its managing director expected its main markets to be North America and the European Union.[26] Another company, Medi Kingdom, said that it had sent ten packages of samples to Canada for testing on 26 March 2018.[27] Lesotho reported to the INCB 9 hectares of licensed cannabis and 16 kilograms produced in 2017, and 18.5 hectares and 30,738 kilograms in 2018.[28]: 47 In October 2019 the health minister said that the INCB had expressed concern that only five of 145 licence holders were operating.[29]
In April 2021 MG Health, formerly Medigrow, announced that it was the first manufacturer in Africa able to export medicinal cannabis flower to the European Union, after the government of Upper Bavaria confirmed its compliance with good manufacturing practice at the request of a Munich importer, Drapalin Pharmaceuticals.[6] In June 2022 Drapalin stated that it had been the first company to supply medical cannabis from Africa to pharmacies throughout Germany, with MG Health as its partner.[30] A study of the sector published in 2024 found that only one company exported cannabis flower to the European Union, and that most licensed companies had not met the manufacturing standards needed to export.[5]
The Lesotho Defence Force said that on 13 January 2021 it had intercepted 53 bags of medical cannabis from a licensed producer on their way to South Africa; the Sunday Express of Maseru reported that some cannabis grown for medical purposes was being smuggled into South Africa for its recreational market.[31]
See also
References
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 1.12 1.13 1.14 1.15 Laniel, Laurent (1999). Cannabis in Lesotho: a preliminary survey (Report). MOST Discussion Paper. Paris: UNESCO, Management of Social Transformations Programme. SHS-99/WS/6. Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 2.10 Paterson, C. (2009). Prohibition and resistance: a socio-political exploration of the changing dynamics of the southern African cannabis trade, c. 1850 – the present (MA thesis). Rhodes University.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (2006). World Drug Report 2006. Volume 1: Analysis (PDF) (Report). United Nations. ISBN 92-1-148214-3.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Annual Report on the Social and Economic Progress of the People of Basutoland, 1935 (Report). Colonial Reports, Annual. London: HMSO. 1936 – via Wellcome Collection.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Thetsane, Regina M. (2024). "Envisaging challenges for the emerging medicinal Cannabis sector in Lesotho". Journal of Cannabis Research. 6 (1) 23. doi:10.1186/s42238-024-00229-9.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 Anderson, Alistair (15 April 2021). "Lesotho manufacturer gets green light to export cannabis to EU". Business Day. Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ Nkosi, P.I.; Devey, R.; Waetjen, T. (2020). "Cannabis policing in mid-twentieth century South Africa". Historia. 65 (1). doi:10.17159/2309-8392/2020/v65n1a4.
- ↑ Annual Report on Basutoland for the Year 1951 (Report). London: Commonwealth Relations Office; HMSO. 1952 – via Wellcome Collection.
- ↑ 9.0 9.1 9.2 9.3 9.4 9.5 Bloomer, J. (2009). "Using a political ecology framework to examine extra-legal livelihood strategies: a Lesotho-based case study of cultivation of and trade in cannabis". Journal of Political Ecology. 16 (1): 49–69. doi:10.2458/v16i1.21691.
- ↑ 10.0 10.1 Bloomer, J. (2019). "Turning cannabis into cash: agrarian change and Lesotho's evolving experience". EchoGéo (48). doi:10.4000/echogeo.17612.
- ↑ Moremoholo, Manthatisi Corinne (January 1998). The nature of cross border linkages between Lesotho and KwaZulu-Natal and aspects of Basotho migrants in Pietermaritzburg (MA thesis). Pietermaritzburg: University of Natal. hdl:10413/5943.
- ↑ "30 donkeys, 13 men and 66 bags of dagga". IOL. 20 September 2013. Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ Maree, Maretha (4 September 1998). Substance use: youth and culture in Namibia (PDF). International Council on Alcohol and Addiction. hdl:11070/656 – via University of Namibia Scholarly Repository.
- ↑ 14.0 14.1 14.2 14.3 Gastrow, P. (2003). Mind-blowing: the cannabis trade in southern Africa (Report). Cape Town: Institute for Security Studies.
- ↑ 15.0 15.1 15.2 15.3 Laniel, L. (August 2001). "Cannabis in Lesotho". Seminar. No. 504. Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ Kynoch, Gary; Ulicki, Theresa; Cekwane, Tsepang; Mohapi, Booi; Mohapi, Mampolokeng; Phakisi, Ntsoaki; Seithleko, Palesa (2001). Cross-border raiding and community conflict in the Lesotho-South African border zone (Report). Migration Policy Series. Waterloo, Ontario: Southern African Migration Programme.
- ↑ 17.0 17.1 United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (2006). "Review of the world cannabis situation" (PDF). Bulletin on Narcotics. LVIII (1 and 2). New York: United Nations (published 2008).
- ↑ United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (2011). World Drug Report 2011 (PDF) (Report). New York: United Nations. ISBN 978-92-1-148262-1.
- ↑ International Narcotics Control Board (2004). "Analysis of the world situation: Africa" (PDF). Report of the International Narcotics Control Board for 2003 (Report). New York: United Nations. E/INCB/2003/1.
- ↑ International Narcotics Control Board (2001). "Analysis of the world situation: Africa" (PDF). Report of the International Narcotics Control Board for 2000 (Report). New York: United Nations. ISBN 92-1-148131-7. E/INCB/2000/1.
- ↑ International Narcotics Control Board (2006). "Analysis of the world situation: Africa" (PDF). Report of the International Narcotics Control Board for 2005 (Report). New York: United Nations. ISBN 92-1-148209-7. E/INCB/2005/1.
- ↑ "Joint SA-Lesotho crime operation sees 264 arrests". Mail & Guardian. South African Press Association. 2 August 2006. Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ International Narcotics Control Board (2007). "Analysis of the world situation: Africa" (PDF). Report of the International Narcotics Control Board for 2006 (Report). New York: United Nations. ISBN 978-92-1-148218-8. E/INCB/2006/1.
- ↑ Drugs of Abuse Act, 2008(Act No. 5 of 2008 No. 34), 27 May 2008.Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ International Narcotics Control Board (2019). "Analysis of the world situation: Africa". Report of the International Narcotics Control Board for 2018 (PDF) (Report). Vienna: United Nations. para. 365. E/INCB/2018/1. Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ Hall, James (11 October 2017). "Lesotho gives SA firm dagga licence". Cape Times. Retrieved 30 October 2026.
- ↑ Phakela, Mohalenyane (11 May 2018). "Matsipa leads the way in the 'green gold' industry". Lesotho Times. Retrieved 30 October 2026.
- ↑ International Narcotics Control Board. Narcotic Drugs 2022: Estimated World Requirements for 2023; Statistics for 2021 (PDF) (Report). United Nations. ISBN 978-92-1-148371-0. E/INCB/2022/2.
- ↑ "Idle licenses threaten local cannabis industry". Public Eye. 15 October 2019. Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ Drapalin Pharmaceuticals (2 June 2022). "Medizinisches Cannabis von DRAPALIN jetzt auch über Alliance Healthcare und GEHE bestellbar". Apotheke Adhoc (Press release) (in Deutsch). Retrieved 30 October 2026.
- ↑ Mpaki, Bereng (20 February 2021). "Army busts medical cannabis smuggling racket". Sunday Express. Maseru. Retrieved 30 October 2026.