Mokhotlong
More actions
| Mokhotlong | |
|---|---|
| ActiveGrown here in 2000 or later | |
| Hierarchy | |
| Growing Region | Maloti Mountains |
| Geography | |
| Country | Lesotho |
| Province/State | Mokhotlong District |
| Coordinates | -29.22, 29.03 |
| Landscape | |
| Area | 4,200 km² |
| Terrain | Mountains; approximately Mokhotlong District |
| Growing history | |
| Dated accessions | 1999 |
| Documentation | |
| Appellations | 0 |
| Accessions | 1 |
| Conservation | |
| Populations | none documented yet |
Mokhotlong is a cannabis growing area in the mountains of north-eastern Lesotho, named after Mokhotlong District, within the Maloti Mountains growing region. In a field study of 1997 the sociologist Laurent Laniel found the eastern sector of the district, stretching east and south from the Moremoholo river valley and taking in the district capital, Mokhotlong, to be part of a region known for its "first grade" marijuana.[1] The historian Craig Paterson counts Lesotho's Mokhotlong district among the three districts on which the southern African cannabis trade is focused; the others are Hhohho, in Eswatini, and Mpondoland, in South Africa.[2]: 3
Reports of cultivation
Laniel named Mokhotlong, with Berea, Thaba-Tseka and Qacha's Nek, among the four districts where everyone he interviewed said cannabis production was most prevalent.[3] The western sector of the district yielded cannabis of lesser quality than the eastern. The grades are the Basotho's own names for the strength they perceive in the cannabis they grow.[1] First-grade cannabis from Mokhotlong and its neighbouring districts went to Durban, often carried by donkeys and porters across the border into the villages of KwaZulu-Natal.[3]
On 8 April 1999 M. Nüsser collected a sheet of Cannabis sativa in the Sanqebethu valley of Mokhotlong District, in "village environs, cultivated fields". The sheet is held at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh.[4]
A study of 2021 by Kudakwashe Chitofiri, deposited with the University of the Free State, examined illicit cannabis cultivation by the marginalised highland communities of Mokhotlong District. Its abstract describes the district as one of the poorest in Lesotho, whose people had historically supplied cheap sheep products to the rest of the country or cheap labour to the mines of South Africa. It argues that cannabis production was one of the main ways in which its borderland communities dealt with their economic and social marginalisation.[5]
Accessions
| Accession ID | Name | Collected |
|---|---|---|
| Nüsser 4459 (1999) | Nüsser 4459 herbarium specimen, Sanqebethu Valley, Mokhotlong (1999) |
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See also
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 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.
- ↑ 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 Laniel, L. (August 2001). "Cannabis in Lesotho". Seminar. No. 504. Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ "Cannabis sativa L., E00313428". Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh Herbarium Catalogue. Retrieved 21 October 2026.
- ↑ Chitofiri, Kudakwashe (9 November 2021), 'Matekoane ke bophelo' Cannibis is Life: marginality and survival, a historical analysis of illicit cannabis production by the communities of Mokhtlong District of Lesotho (Video), University of the Free State, doi:10.38140/ufs.16936975.v1