Terveyden ja hyvinvoinnin laitoksen kyselytutkimus tulossa

[varpaat veessä]

toivottavasti saa paljon julkisuutta.
*ristii sormensa*

ja kirjoittaa lisää viestiin..

[nabeess]

Jaa.. vieläkös kysely on menossa. kannatteeko tohon vielä vastata?

[nabeess]

Onko olemassa saman laista kyselyä enään? kun kummiski on kyse vuoden vanhasta topicista.

[metsuri]

Mulle tippu tänään postista thl:än päihdetutkimus 2010 juuri sopivasti kun olen kuumeen takia pois koulusta, onpahan jotain tehtävää.

Ainoa miinus löyty heti alku sivulta---> Tutkimukseen on poimittu Tilastokeskuksen Suomen väestöä koskevasta tietokannasta satunnaisesti 4200 henkilön otos 15-69- vuotiaista suomalaisista.

Eli tämä kysely pitäisi tehdä jokaiselle suomessa asuvalle, tämä kuiteski menee niin että minä vs 4199 vastaukset ja 4199 sattui arvonnalla olemaan juuri näitä vastustavia ja mitään mistään tietämättömiä.

[The Groke]

4200 on aika hyvä otos, tuskimpa ne tulokset valitettavasti paljoa muuttuisivat.

[Pun Worg]

Vaikka tämä tutkimusprojekti ei olekaan edennyt ihan aikataulussaan erinäisistä syistä, niin sen verran mitä minä sen takana vaikuttavia henkilöitä tiedän, ei se ole taatusti jäämässä pöytälaatikkoonkaan. Aineisto, jota on kerätty kymmeniltä kotikasvattajilta henkilökohtaisin haastatteluin ja tuhansilta tuolla nettilomakkeella, on olemassa ja on vain ajan (ja rahoituksen) kysymys koska siitä saadaan tuloksia irti.

[The Groke]

Toivottavasti rahoitus järjestyy. Tuo tulee (toivottavasti) muuttamaan sitä käsitystä että keskiverto kannabisnisti on työtön sohvalla makaava sekakäyttäjä...

[Antti Alien]

Ainoa miinus löyty heti alku sivulta---> Tutkimukseen on poimittu Tilastokeskuksen Suomen väestöä koskevasta tietokannasta satunnaisesti 4200 henkilön otos 15-69- vuotiaista suomalaisista.

Eli tämä kysely pitäisi tehdä jokaiselle suomessa asuvalle, tämä kuiteski menee niin että minä vs 4199 vastaukset ja 4199 sattui arvonnalla olemaan juuri näitä vastustavia ja mitään mistään tietämättömiä.

Satunnaisuus tarkoittaa sitä, että tietyllä (melkoisen hyvällä) todennäköisyydellä nuo 4200 ihmistä vastaavat Suomen väestöjakaumaa. Juuri tosin tuli tutkimus siitä, että hyvin jakautuneesta satunnaisesti valitusta joukosta ne, jotka sitten vastaavat kyselyyn, ovatkin suurimmaksi osaksi tiettyä, ei lainkaan satunnaisesti valikoituvaa ihmistyyppiä. http://www.tekniikkatalous.fi/tk/articl ... =-31082010

[vihreä_valo]

No niin, nyt ois tuloksia olemassa! Tästä voisi tehdä uuden ketjun ja laittaa tietenkin tutkimustulos-ketjuun. Eli Modet huomio!!

---

Small-Scale Cannabis Growers in Denmark and Finland
Lähde: European addiction research Vol. 17, No. 3, 2011
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/21325852
http://content.karger.com/produktedb/pr ... doi=322920

Abstract
Aims: To compare domestic cannabis cultivation in Denmark and Finland
to describe national characteristics in small-scale cannabis growing.
Design: A Web survey conducted among small-scale cannabis growers in
Denmark (June to November 2008) and Finland (May to June 2009).
Participants: Current cannabis growers (Denmark, 401; Finland, 1,054).
Measurements: Comparisons in regard to social background, growing
history, practices, purposes and motives of growing, and perceptions
of risks. Findings: Cannabis was cultivated primarily for own use, but
sharing with friends and avoiding criminal circles also were
significant motives for growing. Finnish growers prioritized indoor
cultivation, whereas the Danes were more in favor of open-air
plantations. Risks of getting caught by the police were observed to be
greater in Finland. Growing for medical purposes was twice as
prevalent in Finland as in Denmark. Conclusions: Cannabis growing is a
stronger and more novel phenomenon in Finland than in Denmark, but
both countries have been influenced by international trends. Finnish
and Danish small-scale cannabis cultivators can be considered to be
ideologically oriented lifestyle growers. Differences in the magnitude
of the phenomenon may reflect differences in the availability and
quality of cannabis in national drug markets. The Internet had
promoted the spreading of the trend.

Findings: Cannabis was cultivated primarily for own use, but sharing
with friends and avoiding criminal circles also were significant
motives for growing. Finnish growers prioritized indoor cultivation,
whereas the Danes were more in favor of open-air plantations. Risks of
getting caught by the police were observed to be greater in Finland.
Growing for medical purposes was twice as prevalent in Finland as in
Denmark.

Introduction

For the last 20 years, world cannabis markets have changed markedly
from being international toward being more regional/local and, in
Europe, also more herbal [1–3] .

The growth of domestic cultivation of cannabis for recreational use
has important implications for policy and research. Drug markets and
drug distribution usually have been discussed and studied from the
point of view of importation as drugs have traditionally originated
from outside the consuming country. However, the increase of domestic
cannabis cultivation and the development of advanced cultivation
technologies and new strains have challenged the prevailing views and
policies.

Furthermore, attention has been drawn to the fact that the new and
more sophisticated technologies have enabled the production of
cannabis with a raised tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) content, leading to
concerns in the EU countries over an increase in cannabis misuse
and/or harms [4, 5].

The international literature on domestic cannabis cultivation
represents a wide spectrum of approaches and covers a wide range of
topics based on studies from countries all over the world, such as
aspects regarding large scale, commercial production [1, 6–10] ,
criminal organization and law enforcement responses to large-scale
cultivation [11–16] , and small-scale growing [17–20] . Despite this
literature on cannabis cultivation beginning to be published already
in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the phenomenon is changing, and we
still do not know the
phenomenon very well yet. For example, the importance of small-scale
independent cannabis cultivation is clearly an under-researched area
[21] .

Furthermore, we know that increasing home growing of cannabis is an
international
trend, but we do not know if the phenomenon or mechanisms behind it
are similar or not in different countries. These are questions
primarily for a comparative design.
In this article, we present results from a comparative Web survey
study conducted among small-scale cannabis growers in Denmark and
Finland. We will show and
describe similarities and differences between these two countries and
analyze the findings in national contexts and in relation to the
international trend of increased domestic cultivation in Europe.
Hardly any previous studies have been carried out on cannabis
cultivation and cultivators in the Nordic countries, and in the
international literature, there are no comparative studies based on
similar
empirical data on the subject.

Denmark and Finland: Similarities and Differences

As sites of comparison, Denmark and Finland are not too different for
a successful comparative study. Finland covers a much bigger
geographical area than Denmark,
but the countries are alike in terms of population (Denmark, 5.5
million, and Finland, 5.4 million). Compared with Denmark where the
population density is 128 inhabitants per square kilometer, Finland,
with a population density of 17 inhabitants per square kilometer, is
one of the most sparsely populated countries in Europe. Although there
are obvious differences between the two countries, Denmark and Finland
generally follow the Nordic welfare state model and share common
features of Scandinavian culture [22] . Internet penetration is at the
same level in both countries (Denmark, 84.2%, and Finland, 83.5%),
which makes a Web survey applicable for comparison between the two
countries [23] .

Geographically, Finland is located farther away from the main drug
markets and the highways of the drug routes of Central Europe.
Denmark’s direct connection to the rest of Europe has traditionally
provided the main connecting link to drug markets in the other
Scandinavian countries. From the mid-1960s and onward, drug markets in
Copenhagen have been known as central for cannabis smuggled into
Finland [24, 25] . Especially, the open cannabis market at
Christiania, which was closed by the police in 2004, was perceived as
Northern Europe’s largest open cannabis market [26, 27] .

Cannabis is the most widely used illegal drug in both countries. The
substance consumed has traditionally been resin imported primarily
from Morocco and, to a
less extent, from Lebanon and Afghanistan. The two countries have
notable differences in the spread of drug use, the size of drug
markets, and the lines of drug policy. For a long time, Denmark has
been known as a country with a very high prevalence of cannabis use
(LT = 45%, LY = 9%, LM = 4%), whereas Finland has been found to have a
relatively low prevalence of cannabis use compared
with other European countries (LT = 13%, LY = 3%, LM = 1%) [28] .
Since the mid-1990s, the use of cannabis has gained a stronger footing
among the younger generations in Finland [29] .

Attitudes toward cannabis among the general population have been more
liberal in Denmark than in Finland [30] . The Danish drug policy has
been quite tolerant toward cannabis. Possession of cannabis for own
use was depenalized from 1969 to 2004. In practice, Danish drug policy
made a distinction between ‘hard’ and ‘soft’ drugs [31] . However,
changes in drug policy at the beginning of the millennium have shifted
Danish drug policy to a more restrictive line [32, 33] . Maximum
sentences for drug offences have been raised, preventive control
measures of various sorts are enhanced, and any possession of illegal
drugs, including cannabis, is now penalized [34] .

In Finland, drug policy has followed a restrictive line for decades,
and the use of cannabis has been criminalized and punishable by
sanctions [35, 36] . In the late
1990s, harm reduction was accepted as a part of the drug policy, but
it did not change the policy line in regard to cannabis in any way
[37, 38] .

Cultivation of cannabis is illegal in both Finland and Denmark, except
that with an official license, hemp with a low THC content can be
cultivated for industrial purposes (textiles, animal feed, etc.).
However, the two countries differ when it comes to selling and buying
hemp seeds and special equipment for growing. In Denmark, it is legal
to buy and sell seeds and equipment, and these products are available
from stores – often called grow or head shops – in the bigger cities
in Denmark as well as from Internet stores based in Denmark. In
Denmark, cannabis growers buy seeds from these stores and also get
seeds by exchanging with each other. In Finland, selling and buying of
cannabis seeds for use as a drug is prohibited. However, different
stores in Finland’s biggest cities sell equipment suitable for plant
cultivation. Seeds are usually ordered from abroad via the Internet or
acquired from another grower [39] .

As the southernmost country of Scandinavia, Denmark has more favorable climate
conditions for outdoor cultivation than Finland whose northern regions
have a subarctic climate. In Denmark, no research yet has been done on
domestic cannabis cultivation. Furthermore, police statistics on
cannabis seizures are of no help, as they do not make a distinction
between herbal cannabis and imported hashish. However, over the last
few years, the Danish media have intermittently reported about police
raids on socalled cannabis factories or skunk farms and the arrests of
managers. Occasionally, mainly during the late months of summer, the
media report stories about local captures of outdoor-grown hemp
plants. However, data on whether cannabis cultivators get fined or
sentenced and for how many plants has not yet been studied
systematically. Thus, it is not possible to provide any substantiated
indications as to how large a proportion of the cannabis consumed in
Denmark is locally produced; in relation to this, local cannabis
probably accounts for only a smaller share of total consumption. In
Finland, the seizure data shows that home growing has increased
remarkably [39] .

In the 1980s, the police confiscated only some tens of plants annually
and, in the 1990s, no more than a few hundred plants per year. Since
2001, the police have confiscated several thousands of plants
annually. In 2007, the number of confiscated plants rose to 7,600, and
in 2008, the number increased to 14,000. The most common sentence for
cannabis cultivation is a fine. Growers, mostly young
men, fined in the court for cultivating cannabis usually have had a
very modest plantation, consisting of only 1–5 plants in 40% of the
cases [40] .

In fact, bigger plantations that would produce cannabis for sale in
the drug markets
in large quantities have very rarely been uncovered in Finland [36] .
However, even if the Finnish cannabis markets have become more herbal,
it still seems that resin
clearly rules the markets, at least when looking at the seizure data
[41] . Thus, both Finland and Denmark are clearly at a lower level
when compared with such European countries, such as the UK and the
Netherlands, where domestic production has been estimated to exceed
50% of the total consumption of cannabis [17, 20] .

Methods

Data were collected through a Web survey. In Denmark, it ran from June
to November 2008, whereas in Finland, it ran from May to June 2009. In
Finland, the number of respondents totaled 1,298, of whom, 1,054 were
current growers. In Denmark, the number of respondents totaled 565, of
whom, 401 were current growers. Only questionnaires with all questions
answered were included in the study. Incomplete questionnaires, that
is, questionnaires where all questions were not answered or
questionnaires with obvious flaws (e.g. where answers to one question
contradicted answers to other questions), were excluded from the final
quantity. Obvious flaws could be, for example, that a respondent
stated to be 20 years of age and had been cultivating cannabis for 14
years. In the present study, only current growers are included.

The Danish questionnaire was inspired by a Belgian study on cannabis
cultivation performed by Decorte [42] , focusing on cannabis growers’
own perspectives, motives, and experiences with cannabis cultivation;
ways of growing (indoor/outdoor); manner of distributing cannabis –
both for profit and nonprofit; motivations
for growing cannabis, and advantages and disadvantages. Ten extra
questions regarding some technical details of growing practices for
national reporting were added to the Finnish version, but the main
points of the questionnaire remained the same. In Denmark, the survey
was provided by SurveyXact. It was accessible through the Centre for
Alcohol and Drug Research’s homepage (www.crf.au.dk) and was online
for four months. In Finland, the survey was provided by Webropol. It
was opened on the Web pages of the National Institute for Health and
Welfare
(www.thl.fi/kukka) and was online for 1 month. Because of the
sensitive and deviant legal status of the subject, the IP addresses of
the respondents were not collected in either Finland or Denmark. This
made it impossible to control if the same respondent had answered more
than once from the same computer. However,
answering 55–65 questions more than once would have taken quite a long
time, which means that filling out the questionnaire several times
would not have been very tempting or the obvious thing to do.

The difference in response rate in the two countries cannot (only) be
explained by higher numbers of cannabis cultivators in Finland than in
Denmark (see also the Discussion section below). Another
methodological reason could be the differences in how the survey was
received by cannabis enthusiasts, and this could be an important
reason. In Finland, the questionnaire was promoted on two Internet
sites focusing on cannabis or drug issues in general
(www.paihdelinkki.fi, www.kannabisuutiset. wordpress.com) and on a
site dedicated to cannabis cultivation above all (www.hamppu.net). In
addition, a flyer presenting the study was distributed to the
participants of the Million Marihuana March in three cities. The
survey in Finland was announced to be online for 1 month. The
promotion of the study went smoothly. It was the first time this kind
of data was to be collected, and people encouraged each other on the
Web pages to participate in the survey.

Before the survey was published, the study was reviewed by the ethical
committee of THL. In Denmark, the questionnaire was promoted on
various Danish drug debate Web sites where cannabis use and
cultivation also are discussed (www. psychedelia.dk,
www.hampepartiet.dk, www.cannabismyter.dk) and by means of flyers at
major education institutions and to more targeted groups, such as the
clientele of grow shops. The survey was announced to be online for 4
months. However, the response to the study among cannabis enthusiasts
was not uniformly positive.

On one of the Web sites where the issue was debated, members were
dissuaded to fill out the questionnaire. The argument was that too
much attention on cannabis cultivation could further police actions
toward this phenomenon, fearing the possible implications of the
changing drug policy situation in Denmark on small-scale cannabis
growers, as previously described. However, the recruitment of
respondents increased markedly owing to the press coverage that
followed a radio interview and a newspaper article in early October
2008. The study was approved by the Danish Data Protection Agency.

With respect to the use of Web surveys, we acknowledge the
reservations that can be held against the validity and
representativeness of data obtained through anonymous net surveys and
self-completed questionnaires [19, 42, 43] . That said, we like to
argue that an anonymous Web survey is a good way of reaching a hidden
subpopulation, such as cannabis cultivators. It might even be a better
way of reaching the target group than a representative sample of the
general population where only a few of the respondents would be
cannabis cultivators. In that sense, a Web survey can provide good
data on a special group, such as small-scale cannabis cultivators. It
reveals the demographic characteristics of a larger group of
Finns/Danes engaged in growing and provides insight into questions
about cannabis growing in terms of procedure, cost, and rationale.
Although the results do not allow us to generalize to the general
population or not even to the entire subpopulation of cannabis
growers, the survey substantially widens our knowledge about domestic
cannabis cultivation phenomenon. Besides the Web survey, qualitative
interviews with cannabis growers were performed in Denmark (n = 42)
and Finland (n = 38).

In the present article, interview data that are reported elsewhere
[44, 45] will only be used to give some perspective for the survey
results.

Results

Basic Description of Respondents

As shown in table 1 , the Danish and Finnish respondents had some
remarkable differences in terms of the social background. Most
importantly, there was a clear
difference in the age distribution. The Danish respondents (mean age,
37.2 years; range, 14–75 years) were older than the Finnish
respondents (mean age, 24.6 years; range, 14–60 years). This basic
disparity can be seen to be reflected in other variables, such as
marital status/domestic partnership, having children, education, and
occupational status. A majority of the Danish respondents shared the
basic conventional characteristics of adult people, whereas most of
the Finns still lived like youngsters or young adults. However, one of
the common features was the overwhelming dominance of male
respondents. The share of those who had completed a university degree
was relatively high in both countries.

Growers’ Profiles

Most of the growers in both Denmark (92.3%) and Finland (96.5%) were
current cannabis users themselves. In Finland, most of the respondents
(69.1%) had started their growing activity at an age of between 18 and
25 years. Only one tenth had started growing at a later age, and
starting after the age of 35 years was really rare (1.6%).

Table 1. Comparing social background of the Danish and Finnish respondents
Denmark (n = 401) Finland (n = 1,054)
n % n %
Gender
Men 365 91.0 975 92.5
Women 36 9.0 79 7.5
Age
=24 years 91 22.7 609 57.9
25–34 years 105 26.2 369 35.1
=35 years 205 51.1 73 7.1
Marital status/domestic partnership
Partner 241 60.1 365 34.6
Single 147 36.7 645 61.2
Status of children
Yes 191 47.6 113 10.7
No 201 50.1 909 86.2
Housing status
Living with others 264 65.8 603 57.2
Living alone 122 30.4 415 39.4
Education
University degree 110 27.4 131 12.4
Occupational status
Employed 203 59.2 387 36.7
Entrepreneurs 45 13.1 63 6.1
Unemployed 23 6.7 166 15.8
Students 72 21.0 320 30.4

The Danish respondents had started growing at a clearly older age.
Approximately one third of the Danes (34.4%) reported that they had
started growing in their late 20s or later, and as many as 11.0% had
started after the age of 35 years. For figure 1 , the age of onset of
growing was transformed to a new variable of ‘year of first
plantation’ by using the year of birth of the respondent. Because the
age of onset of growing was categorized (younger than 18, 18–25,
26–35, 36–45, 46–55 and older than 55 years), we had to use mean
values of the categories. However, this provides us with a rough
estimate to compare the development of the trend in Denmark and
Finland.

In figure 1 , cumulative percentages indicate a share of respondents
that started cannabis growing at a certain age. As can be seen, there
is a clear increase in growing activity in the 2000s in both
countries, but the phenomenon seems to be more novel in Finland than
in Denmark. In fact, according to the Finnish data, virtually no
cannabis was grown in Finland before the turn of the millennium.

A necessary prerequisite to becoming a cannabis grower is to acquire a
basic knowledge on how to cultivate successfully. As shown in table 2
, the most essential
sources of knowledge for the respondents were other growers, the
Internet, literature, and peers. It is interesting to note that in the
Finnish data, the Internet was considered to be the most essential
source. However, when we look at the data by age groups, we can notice
that the meaning of the Internet clearly increases among the younger
respondents. In fact, among those 24 years and
younger, the meaning of the Internet was at the same level in both
countries. Even if gathering data through a Web survey may
overemphasize the meaning of Internet in responses, results imply,
especially when considering the high Internet penetration, that among
the newcomers of today, the Internet would be seen as the key source
of knowledge for cannabis growers.

According to their growing experience, respondents consisted of both
beginners and relatively experienced growers. When asked how many
times they had harvested, the most typical answer was 2–5 times
(Denmark, 32.2%; Finland, 38.9%). A typical season time for a cannabis
harvest is 3–4 months. However, the share of those who had harvested
more than six times (Denmark, 42.4%; Finland, 26.1%) was clearly
bigger among the Danes.

When considering the difference in age of the respondents, it was not
surprising that the Danes were more experienced growers than the
Finns.

Respondents in both countries mainly engaged in small-scale cannabis
growing. The number of plants in a plantation was 1–5 for 72.8% and
6–20 for 24.3% among
the Finns, and 38.2% and 38.7%, respectively, among the Danes. Thus, a
clear majority of the respondents (Finland, 97.1%; Denmark, 76.9%)
were growing no more than 20 plants in their plantations. In Finland,
only some individual respondents exceeded the limit of 20 plants, but
in Denmark, 12.2% of the respondents reported a plantation containing
21–50 plants. Three people in the
Finnish data and two people in the Danish data reported growing more
than 500 plants at a time. Even if smallscale patterns dominated in
both countries, the Danish growers seemed to have somewhat bigger
plantations than the Finns. However, the differences may be explained
by their preferences concerning the sites of growing.

Indoor cultivation was more typical in the Finnish data than in the
Danish one. In fact, the Finnish respondents seemed to be real home
growers. Nearly 80% of the
Finns grew their plants at home, whereas in Denmark, growers preferred
open sky sites (56.1%) over one’s home (43.6%). Obviously, if one is
growing cannabis at his/her home (e.g. in a cupboard, wardrobe, or
toilet) it might be difficult to exceed 1–5 plants at a time. On the
other hand, an open sky site enables the grower to have a bigger
plantation if he or she prefers.

In Finland, the most typical pattern (86.9%) was growing sometimes
alone and sometimes with others, whereas most of the Danish
respondents (64.3%) preferred to grow alone only. Approximately one
tenth (Denmark, 13.7%; Finland, 6.6%) did not know any other grower.
This was most prevalent among the respondents older than 35 years.
Most typically (Denmark, 49.9%; Finland, 41.5%), the respondents told
that they knew 1–5 other growers.

0
1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
Denmark Finland
Fig. 1. Onset of cannabis growing in Denmark and Finland.


Purposes and Motives for Growing Cannabis

The purposes and motives for growing cannabis were quite similar in
Denmark and Finland. In table 3 , we see that the purpose of growing
cannabis was in both countries primarily for pleasure (Finland, 94.6%;
Denmark, 91.5%) and to share with peers (Finland, 58%; Denmark,
52.9%). However, the share of those growing for medical purposes was
smaller in Denmark (23.7%) than in Finland (58.8%).
The respondents’ motives for growing cannabis are presented in table 4 .

The percentages displayed include the important and very important
answers. The results show that the primary purposes were for their own
use (Denmark, 94.0%; Finland, 88.1%), for the pleasure of growing
(Denmark, 87.8%; Finland, 88.1%), and to avoid criminals (Denmark,
76.6%; Finland, 88.6%); it also was cheaper
(Denmark, 66.5%; Finland, 76.0%) and perceived to be healthier
(Denmark, 57.1%; Finland, 76.7%). Importantly, selling was of low
priority (Denmark, 3.9%; Finland, 7.2%). Although selling was of low
priority as a purpose of growing cannabis, 37.9% in Finland and 14.7%
in Denmark had at least occasionally sold cannabis that they had
grown. The number in Denmark constitutes a smaller part of the
population than the number in Finland. However, in both countries,
those respondents sold mainly to persons they know (Denmark, 88.5%;
Finland, 85.8%) and to a limited number of persons, mainly 1–5 persons
(Denmark, 77.0%; Finland, 71.6%). In Finland, the earnings from
selling cannabis were less than EUR 100 for 41.1% of the respondents
that had tried to sell cannabis (37.9%), whereas 33.5% of the
respondents had earned between EUR 100 and 1,000, and 20.3% did not
know or did not want to answer. In Denmark, 37.7% of the people who
had sold home-grown cannabis (14.7%) earned less than DKK 500 (EUR 67)
and 37.7% of them earned between DKK 500 and 8,000 (between EUR 67 and
1,067). Also, only very few sold other kinds of drugs, 4% in Denmark
and 3.8% (mostly hash) in Finland.

Table 2. Most important sources of knowledge by age group, % of the
respondents evaluated the meaning of a source as essential
Denmark (n = 401) Finland (n = 1,054)
=24 years 25–34 years =35 years total =24 year s 25–34 years =35 years total
Other growers 72.6 72.4 58.1 65.4 82.1 83.2 64.4 81.2
Internet 90.1 80.0 41.4 62.5 93.9 92.1 87.7 92.8
Literature 56.1 57.1 60.5 58.6 36.8 45.3 56.2 41.1
Friends 56.1 56.1 48.3 52.9 63.6 62.3 58.9 62.8

Table 3. Respondents’ motives for growing cannabis
Finland Denmark n % n %
Pleasure 997 94.6 367 91.5
As medicine 620 58.8 95 23.7
Sharing with friends 612 58.0 212 52.9
Selling to friends 149 14.1 23 5.7
Sharing with others 79 7.5 14 3.5
Selling to others 52 4.9 6 1.5
Giving as a medicine 144 13.7 48 12.0
Selling as a medicine 31 2.9 4 1.0
Growing for others 16 1.5 1 0.2
Other reasons 64 6.0 49 7.3
More than one answer could be given.

Table 4. Purpose of growing cannabis: percentages show important/ very important
Finland % (n) Denmark % (n)

Cheaper 76.0 (801) 66.5 (267)
Own use 88.1 (929) 94.0 (377)
Pleasure of growing 88.1 (929) 87.8 (352)
Curiosity 51.8 (546) 52.1 (209)
Healthier 76.7 (808) 57.1 (229)
Avoid criminals 88.6 (934) 76.6 (253)
Plant is beautiful 65.8 (694) 58.6 (235)
Easy plant 38.4 (405) 37.2 (149)
Minor risk 49.1 (518) 31.9 (128)
Sharing with friends 31.3 (330) 44.6 (179)
Milder 2.3 (24) 11.5 (46)
Stronger 42.2 (445) 24.0 (96)
Selling 7.2 (76) 3.9 (16)
More than one answer could be given.


Perceptions of Risks

The respondents in both surveys were aware of the illegal nature of
their activity and saw the risk of getting caught by the police as a
major disadvantage. This was
even more so the case in Finland (88.1%) than in Denmark (60.1%),
which most probably reflects differences in tolerance of cannabis use
in those countries. When asked whether growing cannabis is an
advantage, that is, less risky, in contrast with buying cannabis,
41.3% in Finland and 35.4% in Denmark agreed. 58.8% in Finland and
64.6% in Denmark either found it unimportant or neither important nor
unimportant. The respondents’ perception of the risk of getting caught
is displayed in table 5 .

Although there was a difference between Finnish and Danish respondents
in whether they found the risk small or very small, the most
significant difference was that in Finland, 15.4% perceived the risk
as high, compared with 7.7% of the Danish respondents.

In Finland, 19.5% had been in contact with the police, and 14.4% had
been charged for growing cannabis. In Denmark, 5.7% (total = 30) had
been in contact with the police, and of these, 43.3% (total = 13) had
been charged for growing cannabis. The numbers in Denmark thus
constituted a smaller part of the population than those in Finland.
There was no difference between age groups,
that is, the older growers were not more represented, although they
might have been in the market longest and therefore in a more exposed
position. The lower figures for Denmark compared with Finland might be
due to differences in drug policy and police strategies toward
cannabis growers in the two countries.

Discussion

There were many similarities between the Danish and the Finnish
respondents. Most importantly, respondents in both countries mostly
consisted of small-scale growers who cultivated cannabis primarily for
their own use.

Use for pleasure was prioritized, but sharing with friends also was a
significant motive for growing. Avoiding criminal circles operating in
drug markets was named as an important reason for growing in both
Denmark and Finland. Furthermore, respondents reported that growing
your own cannabis is cheaper than buying it from illicit markets. They
also thought that home-grown cannabis is healthier than the stuff sold
in illicit markets. The pleasure of growing was praised. Only a very
few
told that they were growing cannabis to sell it. When some of them did
sell some of their harvest, it was restricted to a limited number of
people who they personally
knew. Earnings from selling were insignificant. In all these features,
the Danish and the Finnish cannabis growers were very similar to those
found in the Belgian study [42] .

The central dividing line in domestic cannabis cultivation goes
between ideological (for own use only) and commercial motivations [2,
10, 17, 21] . Even if it is quite
usual that those ideological growers also may incidentally sell some
of their surplus harvest, this dividing line really matters in that it
separates two different types of
domestic cannabis production and markets, that is, small scale versus
industrial, large-scale cannabis cultivation.

Our respondents in Denmark and Finland represent the ideological side
of domestic cannabis cultivation. Instead of growing to make money and
profits in the market, they were growing for pleasure and sharing with
friends. In a way, they may be seen as lifestyle growers whose only
aim is personal fulfillment and enjoyment in their social networks.
Actually, it was quite clear from the start that commercial growers
and bigger producers may not be interested in responding to a Web
survey such as this, and commercial growers working in these countries
are not represented or are only very few in our data. Our respondents
represent the international trend of increasing ideological
small-scale domestic cannabis cultivation [17, 19, 21, 46] .

The study describes some of the common features of this phenomenon.
However, there also were some striking differences between the Danes
and the Finns that responded to the questionnaire. One of these was
that the Finnish growers clearly prioritized indoor cultivation,
whereas the Danes were more in favor of outdoor cultivation. This
might be connected to the different climate conditions for growing
in these countries. In this respect, the Danish growers in the study
were very close to Belgian growers [42] .

Table 5. Perception of the risk of getting caught by the police
Denmark (n = 401), % Finland (n = 1,054), %
Very big 2.2 2.1
Big 7.7 15.4
Small 34.2 51.4
Very small 40.9 16.1
Don’t know 14.0 14.3
No answer 1.0 0.7

On the other hand, drug policy also may have had an effect. As the
results of the survey show, the Finnish growers were more concerned
about the risk of getting caught by the police, and an indoor
plantation hidden at home may be seen as a safer practice than an
outdoor plantation. This difference in the indoor/outdoor pattern
evidently also explains some other disparities. For example, Finnish
growers cultivated a smaller number of plants than the Danes.

Another striking discrepancy can be found in growing for medical
purposes. This figure was twice as high in the Finnish data than in
the Danish one. Compared with Decorte’s Web survey in Belgium where 2%
stated medical use as a purpose of growing cannabis (the percentage is
given personally by Decorte), the numbers from both Denmark and
Finland represent a larger part of the total population. One
explanation for this difference – not only between Denmark and Finland
but also between Belgium and the two Nordic countries – could be that
the term medical cannabis has entered public and political discourses
and media debates within the past 10 years in Europe. Medicinal
cannabis has recently become legal in a few EU countries, and
medicinal use is the subject of lively debate on different Internet
sites [44] .

Decorte’s survey was run in 2006, the Danish survey in 2008, and the
Finnish survey in 2009. Thus, Finnish respondents have got the
greatest exposure to the debates and discussions about medicinal use
of cannabis. In addition, it can be hypothesized that people in
countries with a harder cannabis control or more negative public
attitudes toward cannabis may tend to justify their activity with
medical purposes more than people in countries with a more lenient
control and public attitudes. Because of the change of discourse,
growing for medical purposes is not that easy to prejudge as growing
for pleasure and recreation.

Furthermore, in Finland, there also is a long cultural tradition to
justify even recreational alcohol use with medical purposes. Perhaps
Finnish cannabis growers
just apply this explanation model derived from alcohol tradition into
the cannabis field. However, this pondering cannot stand as the only
explanation to the differences in numbers in the three countries, and
further research into the use and production of cannabis for medical
use could be welcome in general, not only in the
three countries compared here.

Another interesting issue to discuss is the difference in the number
of respondents in Denmark and Finland. Does it also imply a real
difference in the prevalence of
growing in these countries? Here, we really face the limits of a Web
survey methodology and, thus, are not able to give any definite
answer. We can only speculate. If we take into account that the
availability of cannabis is much better in Denmark than in Finland,
because of Denmark’s closeness to the European cannabis market as
previously discussed, it seems reasonable to conclude
that the Finns may have more grounds to turn to home growing in
greater numbers than the Danes. According to the European ESPAD Study
about 60% of Danish
schoolchildren aged 15–16 years found availability of cannabis as
fairly or very easy whilst in Finland the share was only around 10%
[47] .

In the interview data, the poor availability of cannabis in the drug
markets in Finland
together with low quality often was mentioned as an important
motivation to start growing [45] .

Furthermore, if we assume that the age distribution of respondents
reflected real differences between countries, we can get some
additional support for that line of thinking. Because young people
usually are responsive to new trends, in the market situation as
previously described, they would have acquired the new ideas offered
by the international trend in greater numbers than the Danes. Simply
said, in Finland, growing one’s own cannabis may have been seen as a
solution to problems of scanty availability and poor quality of
cannabis in drug markets. As
indicated in the interview data, in a country of relatively strict
drug control such as Finland, people may even consider growing a less
risky strategy to obtain cannabis
than buy it from illicit drug markets [45] .

It also seems to be evident that cannabis growing is a more novel phenomenon
in Finland than in Denmark, where some growers already started their
own plantations in the 1970s and 1980s. In Finland, home growing of
cannabis is a new fashion, and Finnish cannabis growers seem almost
entirely to be the children of this new wave of smallscale cannabis
growing [17, 21] .

A prerequisite for that is free access to the flow of international
ideas. The Internet provides this access. As the results of the survey
show, the Finns considered the
Internet to be the most important source of knowledge and know-how.
Actually, it also has provided access to contacts, seeds, and other
stuff, regardless of whether
one is living close to a drug cultural center or by the side of the
main drug routes [45] .

In fact, the meaning of the Internet as a source of growing knowledge
also was remarkably strong among the Danish and Belgian growers [42] ,
showing that an international online community has formed around
small-scale cannabis cultivation.

It seems evident that this has strongly promoted the spreading of the
international trend of domestic cannabis cultivation. Cannabis is the
most widely used illicit drug everywhere in Europe. Therefore,
studying changes and trends in the field is of a high social and
political relevance. Until now, almost everything we know about
domestic cannabis cultivation is based on speculation by individual
experts or the representatives of the police in the media.

Our studies shed some light on the situation in Denmark and Finland,
but we clearly need much more research on the topic.

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[numbernine]

Vaikka asiasta kannattaakin tehdä oma ketjunsa niin omista syistäni haluan korostaa että tämä tutkimus osoitti näkemykseni oikeaksi. Suomessa tendenssi kasvattaa vahvuuden ja myynnin osalta on Tanskaa suurempi eli suomeksi sanottuna huono asia. Siksi olenkin ottanut jo aiemmin kantaa asiaan koska tiedän asialla olevan ns. kantaväestön mielipiteisiin suurta merkitystä.

[Soronoo]

Hieno tutkimus. Ihan kokonaan en ehtinyt lukea, mutta ehdottomasti tuo pitäisi saada referoitua suomeksi ja lähetettyä mahdollisimman monelle taholle mediassa. Tieto on voimaa.

[sumppi]

Hieno tutkimus. Ihan kokonaan en ehtinyt lukea, mutta ehdottomasti tuo pitäisi saada referoitua suomeksi ja lähetettyä mahdollisimman monelle taholle mediassa. Tieto on voimaa.

Tutkimuksen sisältö mediafiltterin läpi:

Suomalaiset kotikasvattajat ovat pääasiassa nuoria miehiä (lähes lapsia!), jotka kasvattavat hamppukasveja kotonaan. Nuorimmat kasvattajista ovat vain 14-vuotiaita. Suurimmat kannabisviljelmät käsittävät jopa yli 500 kasvia. Hamppua ei kasvateta vain omaan käyttöön, vaan sitä myös jaetaan kavereille ja osa sadosta menee myyntiin. Asenteet kannabista kohtaan ovat höllentyneet. Kasvatuksen takana on vaarallinen hedonismi-ideologia, joka sallii oman nautinnon tavoittelun vastoin yleistä moraalia. Hamppua kasvatettiin tuskin lainkaan ennen 2000-luvun alkua. Kaiken pahan alku ja juuri on Internet, josta on saatavilla siemeniä ja kasvatusohjeita.

[bananaman]

...

Tutkimuksen sisältö mediafiltterin läpi:

Suomalaiset kotikasvattajat ovat pääasiassa nuoria miehiä (lähes lapsia!), jotka kasvattavat hamppukasveja kotonaan. Nuorimmat kasvattajista ovat vain 14-vuotiaita. Suurimmat kannabisviljelmät käsittävät jopa yli 500 kasvia. Hamppua ei kasvateta vain omaan käyttöön, vaan sitä myös jaetaan kavereille ja osa sadosta menee myyntiin. Asenteet kannabista kohtaan ovat höllentyneet. Kasvatuksen takana on vaarallinen hedonismi-ideologia, joka sallii oman nautinnon tavoittelun vastoin yleistä moraalia. Hamppua kasvatettiin tuskin lainkaan ennen 2000-luvun alkua. Kaiken pahan alku ja juuri on Internet, josta on saatavilla siemeniä ja kasvatusohjeita.

Lol, oikeassa olet! Teeppäs tosta tolleen vielä päinvastainen versio... hauskaa (surullista) miten kaikista tutkimuksista saadaan väännettyä vaikka millaset yhteenvedot!