Spain used to be the gateway for drugs from Morocco and Latin America.

Hashish from North Africa and cocaine from Colombia and Peru crossed the country for the most part in transit towards the north.

But in the meantime the southern European country is itself a producer that is gaining in importance.

In the province of Toledo, the Spanish police have now discovered Europe's largest cannabis plantation - the size of more than 15 football fields.

Civil Guard officers confiscated 135,000 marijuana plants on a farm near Huerta de Valdecarábanos.

According to Spanish press reports, this is the largest amount in Europe so far.

Three men were arrested.

Hans-Christian Roessler

Political correspondent for the Iberian Peninsula and the Maghreb, based in Madrid.

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The plants declared as industrial hemp grew on a twelve-hectare property.

30 tons of dry goods were stored in nearby halls, and 3720 kilograms of ready-to-sell buds were also found.

Supplies were also provided: at the end of September, customs at Madrid airport confiscated 112 kilograms of marijuana buds destined for the plantation.

According to the investigators, mainly foreigners who had neither a residence permit nor a contract and who lived in primitive accommodations were responsible for the cultivation.

Police officers in the area had encountered Vietnamese in previous raids.

The Spanish growing areas are also expanding in the center of the country.

Highest production volume in Catalonia

The province of Toledo is not far from the capital Madrid with its good sales opportunities. However, Catalonia occupies the top position in terms of production. Even before the outbreak of the corona pandemic, the region was in the lead with more than twelve tons of confiscated quantities. This was followed by Andalusia with just under ten tons, then came Valencia at a greater distance, according to figures from the Spanish Ministry of the Interior from 2018. Corona hit the Spanish economy hard. But that was not the case with marijuana. According to the Catalan regional police, 65,000 plants were confiscated in 2015, compared with 265,000 last year. An even larger amount is expected in 2021.

A report by the Catalan police warns of the emergence of a “narco economy”;

Narcos is short for drug dealers in Spanish.

Producers and traders in Spain are fighting each other more and more brutally and rob each other of their harvests;

there have already been several deaths.

Not only in Barcelona and the surrounding area, but also on the Costa del Sol, on whose beaches large foreign dealers have settled.

"Catalonia is the epicenter of the illegal marijuana market in Europe," the police report noted.

Over the past six years, Catalan officials have unearthed 150 gangs dealing in marijuana.

This is another indication that Spain is in the process of becoming the largest producer in Europe.

Majority in favor of legalizing cannabis

Similar to Germany, the legalization of cannabis use is also being debated in Spain. Nine out of ten Spaniards are in favor of allowing its use for therapeutic purposes, according to a survey by the state polling institute CIS. On Tuesday, the Spanish parliament debated a request from several small left-wing parties for the first time. Medical cannabis can already be bought in pharmacies in Spain. For example, the drug Epidyolex, the sale of which is limited to patients with severe epilepsy.

However, it is estimated that more than three million people regularly use cannabis.

This is punished as an administrative offense, while trading is prohibited.

Until recently, Barcelona was an exception with its more than 200 “Cannabis Social Clubs”.

Consumers and producers originally formed a private association there, but this did not prevent tourists from getting supplies in the clubs.

In the summer, the Supreme Court of Catalonia stepped in and lifted the special municipal regulation.