Evaluation and research on drugs is one of the priorities for making political decisions on drugs. That is why the COPOLAD Program has been accompanying, for more than a decade, the National Drug Observatories in Latin America, and in this third phase also in the Caribbean.
Within this framework, one of the Program’s partners, the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction (EMCDDA) organized, with EU funding, a series of technical meetings related to the evaluation and analysis of drug policies. The events, together with the Jamaican National Council on Drug Abuse, took place in Kingston, and focused on three themes:
Cannabis policies: technical dialogue and bi-regional workshop (January 29-31).
This technical dialogue focused on the current state of cannabis policy in Jamaica and provided an opportunity to exchange views with priority stakeholders. On January 31, a bi-regional workshop focused on cannabis policy models and their evaluation, where representatives of cannabis policy administrations from eight Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries presented their own national situations. These included Antigua and Barbuda, Colombia, Grenada, Mexico, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago and Uruguay. These contributions provided valuable input for the update of the 2020 publication “Monitoring and evaluating changes in cannabis policies: insights from the Americas”, which is being prepared in the framework of COPOLAD III with the support of the RAND Europe Research Institute.
Forensic capacity: technical dialogue to support the forensic capacity mapping exercise of Latin American and Caribbean countries (January 31)
On Wednesday, January 31, EMCDDA delegates engaged in a technical dialogue with Jamaican stakeholders and institutions to discuss drug trends, forensic capacity and challenges related to the drug market. The event supported an ongoing mapping exercise on the forensic capacity of LAC countries, which is being carried out within the framework of COPOLAD III. It will help promote future cooperation between EU and LAC forensic institutions.
Towards a Jamaican Early Warning System on New Psychoactive Substances (1-2 February)
COPOLAD III accompanies Jamaica in the field of early warning systems and their importance at national and international level, therefore a workshop was held for experts involved in the implementation of a Jamaican national early warning system, with European and national examples. The Jamaican early warning system was launched on 2 February in the presence of high-level national and international representatives.
