POLICY BRIEF GROWING LIKE WEEDS? Rethinking Albania’s culture of cannabis cultivation Fatjona Mejdini and Kristina Amerhauser DECEMBER 2019 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This publication was produced with the financial support of the United Kingdom’s Conflict, Stability and Security Fund. Its contents are the sole responsibility of The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime and do not necessarily reflect the views of the United Kingdom. Special thanks to the valuable contributions of the numerous Albanian journalists who helped compile this report, in particular Driçim Çaka and Artan Hoxha. Policy briefs on current issues in the Western Balkans will be published on a reg- ular basis by the Civil Society Observatory to Counter Organized Crime in South Eastern Europe. The briefs draw on the expertise of a local civil-society network who provide new data and contextualize trends related to organized criminal activities and state responses to them. The Observatory is a platform that connects and empowers civil-society actors in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia. The Observatory aims to enable civil society to identify, analyze and map criminal trends, and their impact on illicit flows, governance, development, inter-ethnic relations, security and the rule of law, and supports them in their monitoring of national dynamics and wider regional and international organized- crime trends. ABOUT THE AUTHORS Fatjona Mejdini joined the GI-TOC as a field coordinator for the Balkans in September 2018. After a career as a journalist for national media in Albania, she was awarded the Hubert H Humphrey scholarship. In 2015, she joined Balkan Insight as a correspondent, reporting from the Balkan countries. In 2016, she co-established Investigative Journalism Lab, an initiative to develop quality journalism for young Albanian journalists. Kristina Amerhauser is an analyst at the GI-TOC conducting research on the Western Balkans and working on the Civil Society Observatory to counter organized crime in South East Europe. She has a master’s degree in advanced international studies from the Vienna School of International Studies. © 2019 Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without permission in writing from the Global Initiative. Cover photo: © Albanian police burn 1.6 tonnes of cannabis seized near Lazarat, southern Albania. Arben Celi/REUTERS Please direct inquiries to: The Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime WMO Building, 2nd Floor 7bis, Avenue de la Paix CH-1211 Geneva 1 Switzerland www.GlobalInitiative.net CONTENTS Summary and key points �������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������iii Introduction ����������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������1 Why Albania acquired a ‘cannabis culture’ ��������������������������������������������������������������������3 Albania as part of the global illicit economy �����������������������������������������������������������������8 Towards a long-term policy response ��������������������������������������������������������������������������� 10 Notes ���������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������������12 SUMMARY The cultivation of cannabis in Albania goes back several the underlying drivers of this illicit economy are still in decades, but experienced a peak around 2016, at which place. Without a concerted effort to address collusion point the police undertook an eradication operation in in the cannabis market and the country’s structural an attempt to curtail the country’s widespread cannabis conditions, which entice many young people to seek a production industry. A more recent resurgence in livelihood in cannabis production, the conditions that cannabis cultivation, however, points to the fact that enable the market are unlikely to be disrupted. Key points ■■ The conditions that enable cannabis cultivation in ■■ Colluding state officials are among the drivers of the Albania have been in place for many years. Albanian cannabis economy. ■■ Despite police crackdowns on cultivation, the ■■ A new approach is needed to break the cycle of phenomenon continues to be pervasive. reliance that the cannabis economy provides and attract young people into legitimate work. ■■ Cultivating cannabis is seen as a source of income for many, particularly the young. iii INTRODUCTION nder pressure from the international community, the Albanian govern- State police investigate ment engaged in a series of police actions in 2016 to crack down on a cannabis plantation in Uwidespread cannabis cultivation and trafficking. The volume of cannabis southern Albania, April 2017. under cultivation was dramatically reduced as a result. This was hailed as a victory by both the government and external partners. A resurgence in cannabis cultivation more recently, however, highlights that the underlying drivers for cannabis cultivation remain in place – and may even have been stimulated. While the efforts at cannabis eradication in 2016 were seen as a direct result of government intervention, interviews with people involved in the cannabis econ- omy, suggest that a number of market factors – most notably a decline in price due to excess supply – may have been equally important. Interviews conducted for this brief suggest that several criminal actors were already exiting the market at the time in search of more lucrative activities, most notably in the burgeoning cocaine trade. By the end of 2019, however, the picture has once again changed in several sig- nificant ways. Although cultivation has not yet reached the peak levels seen in 2016, there is strong evidence of a shift in cannabis plantations to remote forest and mountainous areas in both the north and south of Albania. Overall, there has been a slow resurgence in cultivation in response to internal and external demand. And, significantly, interviews suggest that young people in particular, disillusioned by poor economic prospects and frustrated by the debates on accession to the EU, do not perceive cultivating cannabis crops for what it is − a serious criminal activity. Rather, it is seen as a means to make a living in an economic climate where few other opportunities exist. The crackdown on the cannabis economy has had a further effect – there has been a trend of young Albanians migrating to Western Europe to cultivate cannabis close to lucrative consumer markets. GROWING LIKE WEEDS? • INTRODUCTION 1 In Albania, police corruption and allegations that the government would prefer the true extent of the cannabis revival to remain under wraps contribute to a condu- cive environment for this illicit market. The authorities are generally aware that cannabis provides a livelihood, particularly for young people, and as long as the problem remains largely out of public and international view, there are few incen- tives for another crackdown. This culture of tacit support for the cannabis economy will need to be reversed A cameraman watches in Albania for the country not to become once again a significant exporter of as Albanian police burn cannabis. It is only one of several criminal economies that are embedded in 1.6 tonnes of cannabis Albania, and it will be difficult to eradicate it without a concerted change in how seized near Lazarat, southern Albania. such activities are viewed by some as legitimate, and widely ignored or protected © Arben Celi/REUTERS by Albania’s law-enforcement authorities. 2 GROWING LIKE WEEDS? • RETHINKING ALBANIA’S CULTURE OF CANNABIS CULTIVATION WHY ALBANIA ACQUIRED A ‘CANNABIS CULTURE’ annabis cultivation has long been a source of seasonal employment in Cannabis cultivated Albania. First accounts date back to the early 1990s, when Albania emerged in a forest in southern Albania, May 2017. Cfrom a 45-year period of isolation imposed by the communist regime (see Figure 1). The swift change from the centralized state to a free-market economy, which was accompanied by the closure of state factories and collective farms, led to high unemployment levels, leaving Albanians with reduced opportunities to earn a living. Some turned to cultivating cannabis, which was seen as an easy and lucrative source of income. Between 2000 and 2014, the rapidly growing mass cultivation industry attracted workers from all over the country, many of them women. The embodiment of this cannabis rush was the village of Lazarat, in the south of Albania and close to the Greek border, which is believed to have produced a remarkable 900 tonnes of can- nabis a year, with a net value of around €4.5 billion.1 Many ordinary workers were employed in planting the seeds and harvesting, drying, processing and packaging until Cannabis cultivation the cannabis batches were ready for smuggling. has long been a By 2000, insiders say, established smuggling lines had been developed both within the region and on to Turkey, but most importantly to the EU. Greece and particularly source of seasonal Italy were major recipients of Albanian cannabis. employment By 2016, the Albanian cannabis economy had spread all over the country as criminal in Albania. groups started to cultivate cannabis in larger volumes. At its peak, the cultivation of cannabis was so widespread in some areas like Vlorë