Canadian cannabis a popular export in Vietnam
Western-grown cannabis appearing in Vietnam, Japan and South Korea
For the young Vietnamese dope smokers rolling up outside a smart Hanoi cafe, local cannabis is just not good enough. As with their Adidas caps, iPhones and Sanskrit tattoos, so with their choice of bud: only foreign will do.
Potent marijuana grown indoors in Canada and the United States is easy to buy in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, say regular smokers, and sells for up to 10 times the price of locally grown weed. That’s perhaps surprising given that marijuana is easy to cultivate regionally, and bringing drugs across continents is expensive and risky.
Some experts say the trade can be explained by the dominant role Vietnamese diaspora gangs play in cultivating the drug in Western countries, making sourcing the product and smuggling it to Vietnam an easier proposition than it might be otherwise.
The characteristics of cannabis use in the country also drive the trade. The drug is used mostly by foreigners and well-heeled Vietnamese, who are prepared to pay for quality. Vietnamese have long shown preferences for imported goods of all kinds - and it appears cannabis is no exception.
The quality and reputation of the Canadian cannabis is such that it could be worth the trouble and cost of importing
Regardless of the reasons, its availability in Vietnam is a sign of how hydroponic growing techniques have shaken up the global marijuana business. In the 1960s and 70s, marijuana went from plantations in countries such as Thailand, India and Morocco to wealthy consumer markets in the West. Now, many Western countries are self-sufficient in the weed because of indoor cultivation, and export is on the agenda.