Uruguay's drug czar has announced how the country will stamp out drug trafficking: by getting into the business of selling pot—legally and dirt cheap. And as long as the plan can get through the Senate (which it's expected to, with President Jose Mujica's help), marijuana sales would begin in the second half of next year. The price would be roughly $1 per gram, drug chief Julio Calzada told a local paper on Sunday. That's a lot cheaper than what medical marijuana users pay in Washington state right now, the AP points out: about $8 to $14 a gram.
For Americans who lack an understanding of what a gram is, that works out to about $3.50 for an eighth, or $28 for an ounce, or $454 for a pound. Calzada helpfully explains it in terms of blunts: A gram is enough "for one marijuana cigarette or two or three slimmer cigarettes." Only locals would be able to buy it, and they could get their hands on a max of 40 grams a month. Smoking pot has long been legal in Uruguay, but growing, carrying, buying, or selling have not. The measure, intended to wrest control of the market from illegal dealers, would make Uruguay the first country in the world to license and enforce rules for the production, distribution, and sale of marijuana. (More Uruguay stories.)
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