First legal cannabis for sale in Breda and Tilburg in December 12:58 in Domestic, Politics It is expected that two legal growers will be ready and both legal and ‘tolerated’ cannabis will be sold in the coffee shops in that start-up phase.

The start-up phase of the cannabis experiment will start on December 15 this year. From that moment on, two growers will legally supply cannabis to coffee shops in Tilburg and Breda. The cabinet has decided that.

Outgoing Health Minister Kuipers had announced earlier this year that the start-up phase would start with three growers, but the third grower was not ready on time. “To maintain support for the experiment, we have decided to deviate from the condition that at least three growers must be ready,” he and his colleague Yesilgöz from Justice write in a letter to the House of Representatives.

With the cannabis experiment, the government wants to determine whether legalization is possible. The trial will investigate the consequences for public health and crime.

Slow start

The suppliers may only supply legal weed to the coffee shops. But as an exception, coffee shops may also sell their tolerated products from old suppliers in the start-up phase. The next two legal growers are expected to start delivering in February.

The ten growers participating in the experiment were selected by lottery at the end of 2020, but the experiment was postponed time and time again. This was mainly due to problems with obtaining permits from the municipalities where they wanted to grow and opening bank accounts.

Transitional phase

The ministers are sticking to their promise to expand the experiment to supply all participating municipalities within six months of the start of the start-up phase. The question is whether all ten growers will be ready for this in time. Some growers have not even started construction of their cultivation site.

The coalition agreement stipulated that an eleventh large municipality would be added. Mayor Halsema of Amsterdam has nominated the East district for participation in the experiment. Discussions about how this will be implemented are still ongoing. The government therefore believes that it is not possible to start at the same time with the ten other municipalities.