Could the community trust model be applied to regulate cannabis? Findings from a survey of two alcohol licensing trust communities in New Zealand

Abstract

Introduction: New Zealand’s Alcohol Licencing Trusts (ALTs) are community-owned entities that sell alcohol in their districts and return profits back to the local community.

Aim: To investigate support for applying the ALT model to regulate legal cannabis.

Method: An online survey asked people living in two ALT districts to rate their support for applying the ALT model to legal cannabis; 2,379 people completed the survey. Logistic regression models were fitted to identify predictors of support for applying the ALT model to cannabis.

Results: Thirty-nine per cent supported the ALT model for legal cannabis. Reasons for support included: the trust’s donations to the community (53%), potential to restrict cannabis sales (43%), controlling the cannabis industry (43%), and better than the current prohibition (42%). Support for the existing ALT (OR = 8.86), recent history of cannabis use (OR = 1.42), younger age (OR = 1.02) and not being in employment (OR = 1.46) predicted support for the model for cannabis. Cannabis users were more likely to support the trust model on pragmatic grounds (‘better than prohibition’) while non-users valued the model’s capacity to responsibly regulate sales and the cannabis industry.

Discussion: The ALT model can offer a middle-ground approach that attracts support from cannabis users and non-users, albeit on different grounds.

Keywords:

• Cannabis
• cannabis law reform
• community trust
• community enterprise
• licencing trust
• New Zealand
• ‘middle ground’ cannabis policy
• public support
• cannabis trust model

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Massey University Research Fund.