Talk:Panama

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Discussion for: Panama • View • Links • Related changes

Use this page for verification notes, disputes, and action items. Keep narrative content on the article.

Page scope

Panama is the Country page for Panama. It covers the names Panamanian law has given the plant (Kan-Jac, Can-Yac, canyac); the drug laws of 1923, 1928, 1954 and 1986 and the Penal Code; the marihuana inquiries in the Canal Zone of 1925 and 1931–1932 and the Canal Zone bill of 1941; the treaties; the medical cannabis law of 2021, its regulations of 2022 and 2025 and its licences; seizures; and the specimens, genebank holdings and seed lines known from the country. The tables of growing regions, growing areas, accessions and news fill from pages that name Panama as their country.

Data verification

Record source conflicts, dating problems and sources not used here. Keep narrative content on the article.

Discussion

Sources and how they were read

Panamanian statutes were read in the scans served by the National Assembly (Legispan) and the Gaceta Oficial. The laws of 1923, 1954 and 2021 survive only as page images; their wording was read by machine and checked against the images. Article 3 of Ley 19 of 1923 was read from the page image at 300 dpi: it reads "el cultivo, el uso y expendio de la hierba Kan-Jac (Canabis índica)" and refers to the penalty of article 1. Only the title of Ley 64 of 1928 was read. Ley 23 of 1986 carries a text layer.
The Penal Code was read in the consolidation of December 2020 published by the Órgano Judicial. It predates Ley 242 of 2021, whose article 72 added a sentence to article 314.
The regulations. Executive Decrees 121 and 85 of 2022 (Gaceta Oficial 29612-A) and Executive Decree 6 of 2025 (Gaceta Oficial 30251-B) are page images. They were read by machine, and the articles the page relies on were checked against the images. Pages 30–43 of Decree 6 (roughly articles 74–137: operations, labelling, transport, records and the first sanctions) have not been read.
Ministry of Health documents (the communiqué of 21 July 2023, the answers to applicants' questions of 27 June 2023 and Resolución 031 of 29 January 2024) were read on the ministry's site, as was the register of cannabis products of the Dirección Nacional de Farmacia y Drogas, which states that the documents it publishes are not, by themselves, official documents. The Gaceta Oficial supplied the resolutions of 2025 and 2026.
The Canal Zone. The report of 21 October 1932 was read in the transcription of the Schaffer Library of Drug Policy, headed "Mariajuana smoking in Panama" and "Taken from: The Military Surgeon Volume 73 - July-December 1933". The transcription carries no page numbers; pages 269–280 are from H.B.M. Murphy's citation in the Bulletin on Narcotics (1963). The authors are given in the order of the signatures: J.F. Siler, W.L. Sheep, G.W. Cook, W.A. Smith, L.B. Bates and G.F. Clark. The transcription shows signs of machine reading ("Sn.ER" for Siler, "marlajuana"), so its spellings are the transcriber's until the printed journal is seen. The account of the 1925 committee comes from the 1932 report, which quotes it. House Report No. 1552 of the 77th Congress (19 December 1941) was read in the scan of the Serial Set on govinfo. Abel (1982) is known from its bibliographic record only.
United States and United Nations reports. The State Department's International Narcotics Control Strategy Report was read for 2003 (issued March 2004), 2007, 2012, 2021 and 2025 (Panama chapters); the INCB reports for 2021 and 2023; the treaty status pages of the United Nations Treaty Collection.
Seizure statistics for 2023 are the preliminary figures of the Ministry of Public Security's Sistema Nacional Integrado de Estadísticas Criminales, compiled from the Instituto de Medicina Legal y Ciencias Forenses.
Specimens and germplasm. The specimens are known from their GBIF records; the genebank line from its GRIN-Global record. The seed lines are described from the keepers' and sellers' own listings, as on the accession pages.

Where the sources differ

Seizures in 2019 and 2020. The INCB report for 2021 gives 12.9 tonnes of cannabis seized in Panama in 2019 and 16.1 tonnes in 2020. The State Department's report of 2021 says the National Aeronaval Service seized 3.3 tonnes of marijuana in 2019 and 10.6 tonnes in 2020, and the National Police a further 3.3 tonnes in 2020. The page gives both, each attributed.
Ley 19 of 1923. An earlier machine reading made the penalty cross-reference "artículo 10"; the page image shows "artículo 1º".
The licences. Press reports of 2024 and 2025 describe Resolución 008 of 17 January 2024 as assigning the manufacturing licences to seven consortia; Telemetro's report of 15 January 2024 is headed "Minsa otorga licencias", but its text says the evaluation commission "recomendó" up to seven. The ministry's Resolución 031 records that seven proposals were found compliant, and in February 2025 the director of pharmacy and drugs said that a modified decree was still needed before the licences could be issued. La Estrella de Panamá reported in April 2025 that no manufacturing or research licence had been issued. In January 2026 the director told TVN that seven licences "para la comercialización" had been granted: licences to market, which may not be the manufacturing licences of the law. Which consortia hold which licence, and from what date, has not been found in a ministry document. The page says the seven proposals were found compliant and reports the 2026 statement as TVN's.
Panamanian law between 1928 and 1941. The 1932 report says that "the law forbidding the possession and use of mariajuana in the Republic of Panama" was repealed in December 1928, which matches Ley 64 of 1928. The House report of 1941 says that Panama "prohibits by law the possession, cultivation, and use" of marihuana. The law that restored the prohibition between those dates has not been identified (see the laws of 1934 and 1937 under "Not used").
The 1925 conclusion. Murphy (1963) quotes it with "marihuana" and an inserted "[Panama Canal Zone]"; the transcription of the 1932 report reads "mariahuana as grown here". The page quotes the transcription.
Who held the inquiries. Murphy calls them two "official army" investigations. In the 1932 report the 1925 committee was appointed by the Governor and made up of four Canal Zone officials, with the Army's Department Judge Advocate, a Navy medical officer and two others as advisers; the committee of 1931–1932 had three members named by the Governor, two by the Army and one by the Navy. The page describes them as committees of Canal Zone and military officials.
Entry into force of Ley 242. Article 83 makes the law apply from the day after promulgation; it was published on 15 October 2021. Panamá América dates its report 17 October and says the law took effect "today".

Not used, and why

A blog post on the regulation of cannabis in the Canal Zone, 1914–1935: a finding aid only. The 1932 report it points to has since been read and is cited instead.
A Universidad de Panamá article (2023) listing laws of 1934 and 1937 on Can-Yac: those laws were not read.
La Prensa on the operating licences held by applicants: the site refused access, and only search summaries were seen.
Seed-company and strain-guide accounts of "Panama Red" and of the 1960s and 1970s trade: not admissible for country facts.
The Wikipedia articles on Panama and on cannabis in Panama: tertiary sources.

Open questions

The Canal Zone documents. The text of Circular No. 5 of 1923, the 1925 committee's own report and the printed pages of The Military Surgeon have not been seen. The Panama Canal Record for 1922–1926 and 1931–1933 was searched without result; the volumes for 1926–1931 were not. Whether the bill of 1941 (H.R. 6196) became law has not been established.
The regulations. Executive Decree 61 of 20 November 2023 and Resolución 925 of 5 December 2023, which Decree 6 of 2025 also repealed, have not been found.
Flora. No treatment of Cannabis in the Flora of Panama has been found; the parts of the flora searched did not cover the families concerned.
Words. No dictionary entry for canyac or Kan-Jac has been found, and no etymology. The 1932 committee's derivation of "mariajuana" from "maraguango" has not been checked against a dictionary; the page gives it as the committee's.
Panama Red. No scholarly or official source on the cannabis trade of the 1960s and 1970s under that name has been found.