On October 17, 2018, Canada implemented landmark legislation, becoming the second nation globally, after Uruguay, to legalise non-medical cannabis. Despite the significance of this legislative change, comprehensive data on the transition from the illegal to the legal cannabis market in Canada has been limited. This scarcity is partly attributable to the challenges in acquiring high-quality data for robust population-based estimates of cannabis consumption, expenditure, and procurement sources.
A recent study has shed light on Canada’s journey since legalising non-medical cannabis in 2018, and the news is significant: a large majority of cannabis spending is now happening through legal channels. This is a big step towards one of the main goals of legalisation – moving consumers from the unpredictable illegal market to a safe, quality-controlled legal one.
How Big is Canada’s Legal Cannabis Market?
The research, published in the International Journal of Drug Policy, explored how much of the cannabis market has been captured by legal sellers in Canada.
The current analysis relied on three primary data sources:
- Data from the Canadian Community Health Survey was used to estimate the number of cannabis consumers in Canada.
- Data from the International Cannabis Policy Study was used to estimate use, expenditures, and legal vs. illegal purchases for specific types of cannabis products.
- Data on retail sales from legal sources reported to provincial and federal governments to compare ‘objective’ vs. ‘self-reported’ estimates of legal market size.
Key Findings of the Analysis
The study, which looked at data up to September 2022, estimated that:
- 22.4% of Canadians (approximately 7,248,000 individuals) aged 12 or over reported cannabis use in the past 12 months.
- Total cannabis spending in Canada was around $6.72 billion CAD.
- $5.23 billion CAD (or 78%) of that was spent on legal cannabis products.
- This left about $1.49 billion CAD spent on illegal sources.
- Sales for medical cannabis accounted for less than 10% of total licensed cannabis sales within each province.
These figures are quite impressive, showing a major shift in consumer habits in the five years since legalisation. The researchers found that their estimates for legal spending were very close (within two percentage points) to the actual retail sales data tracked by the Canadian government, suggesting their survey methods were accurate.
What Cannabis Products are People Buying Legally?
While dried cannabis flower is still the most popular product, accounting for 55% of legal spending in 2022, other products are gaining ground. The study highlighted spending on:
- Dried flower: 55% of total legal expenditures.
- Plants and seeds: An additional 2%.
- Concentrates: 12% of legal spending.
- Oral liquids (like oils): 11%.
- Vaping liquids: 10%.
- Edibles (excluding drinks): 8%.
This variety shows that the legal market is catering to diverse consumer preferences, offering a range of product types beyond just traditional flower.
Why is This Shift to Legal Sources Happening?
The study points to a few key reasons why Canadians are increasingly turning to legal cannabis:
- Better Access: The number of licensed retail stores in Canada dramatically increased, from 182 in late 2018 to over 3,300 by the third quarter of 2023. More stores mean more convenience.
- Competitive Pricing: Prices for legal cannabis have dropped significantly. By 2022, dried flower could be found for as low as $3.00 CAD per gram in legal stores in many provinces – about a quarter of the typical price when legalisation first started.
- Improved Perceptions: Consumers increasingly see legal cannabis as more convenient to buy, higher quality, and safer than products from illegal sources.
The Hidden Dangers of Illicit Cannabis: A Curaleaf Clinic UK Perspective
The move towards legal cannabis sources is not just a matter of market economics; it’s fundamentally about public health and safety. Underscoring this point, Curaleaf Clinic’s White Paper, “The Hidden Dangers of Illicit Cannabis“, reveals startling findings about the risks associated with unregulated products.
Research highlighted in the White Paper found that:
- A staggering 90% of seized illicit cannabis samples contained contaminants. These included mould, yeast, lead, E.coli, or salmonella. Such contaminants can pose serious health risks, especially for individuals with compromised immune systems.
These findings from the Curaleaf Clinic White Paper paint a clear picture of the dangers lurking in the illegal cannabis market and strongly advocate for sourcing cannabis through legal, regulated channels where products are subject to testing and quality control.
What Does This Mean for the UK and Curaleaf Patients?
While the Canadian study focuses on its non-medical cannabis market, the findings, coupled with insights from the Curaleaf Clinic White Paper, offer valuable lessons:
- Safety First: Legal markets, with their regulated products, offer a crucial safeguard against the contaminants and dangerous additives often found in illicit cannabis.
- Legal Markets Can Succeed: Canada demonstrates that with the right approach, legal frameworks can effectively reduce the size of the illegal cannabis market. This is a key objective for ensuring public health.
- Product Diversity and Quality Control: A mature legal market leads to a wider array of products that are quality-controlled. For patients, this means access to products with known potencies and safety standards, which is crucial for medical use.
- Market Evolution Takes Time: The shift from an illegal to a legal market doesn’t happen overnight. It requires time for the infrastructure to build up and for trust and awareness of legal products to grow.
The Canadian experience shows a substantial transition towards a regulated cannabis market. As the legal cannabis sector continues to develop globally, studies like this and vital research like Curaleaf Clinic’s White Paper provide important lessons on how to effectively displace illegal markets and ensure patients have access to safe, regulated products.
The researchers of the Canadian study concluded that Canada has made “substantial progress” in moving consumers to legal cannabis sources, fulfilling a primary goal of its Cannabis Act. This ongoing success story, alongside a clear understanding of the dangers of illicit products, will be watched closely by other nations navigating the path of cannabis reform.
