Customs and Cannabis

I saw recently in the in the Independent that HM Customs and Revenues have had a reduction in about a half of cannabis seizures. The official documentation can be found here.

This is very interesting, why has there been such a big decrease? and can we think of cannabis seizures as a proportion of the imported drug that makes it into the country?

Well I think it is fair to say, if their is demand, black-market items are always going to make it to market, so i think it is true that the amount of seizures can be a proportional representation of how much makes it into the country.

I can now come to answering the first question. The first thought that comes to mind is that it is has been recession times, and drug takers must have budgets too. Well does this make sense? It might be worth looking at an item that can be analysed more easily. Alcohol, also a drug, with arguably a similar addictive-ness, a non-essential item, that serves much the same purpose as cannabis, seem to be a perfect candidate for comparison. So what do the figures say? There has been a sharp decline in demand for alcohol since 2009, amounting to 6%. So a reduction in income doesn't seem to make much sense of the massive decline in cannabis seizures.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11170814
it doesn't seem likely that demand would disappear that fast, and drastically, that demand for cannabis is extremely elastic to income, or even to confidence for the future.

Another possibility, is that there is a chance that Customs workers are more susceptible to bribes by the importers. After all it is still recession times, things are very hard. There is also a large cut in the public sector being undertaken, so these pressures could be adding up. So it could be that the statement i posed might not be true, that seizures represent a proportion of imported cannabis.

I will leave it there for now. Nevertheless the large drop is very interesting!

Introduction

By no means is this written in the pretense that I am an expert in economics. My aim is to set up a dialogue with others who study economics, work in economics, or anyone that has at least an informed (however well formed) opinion in economics.

I will be largely commenting on current affairs, but as I am reading Economics and Philosophy at Leeds University, I believe that it is highly likely that the course will influence the topic I will be discussing.