Expand Ecuador (ec): recreational/hemp/arrests sections, COIP penalty bands, medical article

Article 364 of the constitution treats drug use as a health matter and forbids criminalising users.[@lc] Until November 2023 a threshold table treated up to 10 g of cannabis as personal use; President Noboa repealed it, — a campaign promise — so there is now no safe amount.[@eu] A person caught with any quantity must convince police and a judge that it is for their own use, under rules first set in 2013 to guide the non-criminalisation principle.[@eu] The repeal is traced in the [2023 threshold repeal](/history/ecuador-threshold-table-repealed-2023/).

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Growing cannabis with THC for personal use is not authorised. Only non-psychoactive cannabis under 1% THC may be cultivated, under licence from the agriculture authority — the 2019 reform excluded it from controlled substances.[@pbp19,giq]

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The constitution protects users in principle, but since 2023 enforcement has hardened under an anti-micro-trafficking drive, and small-scale possession cases can lead to pre-trial detention.[@lc,eu] In June 2025 the solidarity law brought back quantity parameters — no longer gram thresholds — to separate consumers from traffickers, a debate traced in the [2025 solidarity law](/history/ecuador-solidarity-law-2025/).[@eu]

Any supply is trafficking, graded by quantity under COIP article 220: three to five years at the smallest band, five to seven at the next, nineteen to twenty-two above that, and twenty-two to twenty-six at the largest.[@coip25]

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Use itself is not a crime under the constitution, but with the thresholds gone, anyone using in public risks being processed as a small-scale dealer.[@lc,eu]

No adult-use source exists. Low-THC medical and wellness products are sold legally under the licensed hemp and medical rules.[@pbp19,giq]

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medicalhemp

The agriculture ministry issues several classes of licence for non-psychoactive cannabis and hemp (under 1% THC), which has attracted commercial growers.[@giq]

Hemp and low-THC products; prescription preparations with tight THC limits.

wiki, giq

Medical cannabis was legalised in 2019: the December reform excluded below-1% THC cannabis from controlled substances and made holding cannabis medicines for therapeutic, on prescriptionpalliative or medicinal use — including alternative medicine — no longer punishable with a professional diagnosis of disease, limited largelyeffective mid-2020 with agriculture-ministry regulations to follow.[@pbp19] Products in practice stay low-THC, with prescription preparations under tight limits.[@giq]

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No record follows if a case is closed as personal use; the risk lies in being charged as a dealer in the first place, where the smallest band starts at three years.[@lc,coip25]

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The agriculture ministry's Agreement 109 sets up seven licences for cannabis with less than 1% THC.[@mag109] Licence 1 covers importing and selling seeds or cuttings, and Licence 2 sowing and producing them; only registered companies, cooperatives, associations and universities may apply.[@mag109] Nothing in the scheme covers seed or cuttings of psychoactive varieties.[@mag109]

No cannabis clubs are known, and no law provides for them: any supply counts as trafficking, graded by quantity under article 220.[@lc,coip25]

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There is no legal recreational supply for anyone, so a visitor has no lawful way to buy cannabis.[@giq] Whatever legal supply exists is medical, for patients with a prescription or registration: holding cannabis medicines for therapeutic use with a professional diagnosis is not punishable.[@pbp19] The sources behind this profile describe no separate rule for visitors.[@giq]

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COIP article 384 penalises driving under the effects of narcotic or psychotropic substance … ction of fifteen licence points; the vehicle is seized preventively for twenty-four hours.[@trafficcoip] This is distinct from article 385's graded alcohol limits.[@trafficcoip] Its special rule for public passenger, commercial and freight drivers states zero toleranc … nety days' deprivation of liberty and loss of thirty points on exceeding the stated limit.[@trafficcoip] That wording does not establish a numerical laboratory THC cutoff.[@trafficcoip] Under article 376, a drug-influenced driver causing a crash that kills one or more people faces ten to twelve years and definitive licence revocation.[@trafficcoip] These are the provisions in the government-hosted consolidation updated to 24 October 2025 … ndments remain verification targets. No fixed waiting time after cannabis use is inferred.[@trafficcoip]

Figures reported by the government to the UN drugs office record 28,591 kg of herbal canna … nd countries count seizures differently, so the figures are not comparable across borders.[@unodc_szr]

Pérez Bustamante & Ponce — The National Assembly of Ecuador decriminalizes production and consumption of medical cannabis (10 Jan 2020) Wikipedia — Cannabis in Ecuador 6 unchanged

label Personal use (Constitution article 364) · treatment tolerated · term Personal use · note Health matter; users must not be criminalised — no safe amount since November 2023, label Possession deemed trafficking, smallest band (COIP article 220.1) · treatment criminal · term Possession · prison min 3 years · prison 5 years · note 3–5 years when personal use is not accepted

label Growing psychoactive cannabis without authorisation · treatment criminal · term Unlicensed cultivation · note No personal-use allowance; licences cover below-1% THC only, label Licensed hemp under Agreement 109 · treatment legal · term Licensed hemp · note Seven licence classes; companies, cooperatives, associations and universities only

label Trafficking, smallest band (article 220.1) · treatment criminal · term Trafficking · prison min 3 years · prison 5 years, label Trafficking, second band (article 220.1) · treatment criminal · term Trafficking · prison min 5 years · prison 7 years, label Trafficking, third band (article 220.1) · treatment criminal · term Trafficking · prison min 19 years · prison 22 years, label Trafficking, largest band (article 220.1) · treatment criminal · term Trafficking · prison min 22 years · prison 26 years

Adult use sits in a constitutional grey zone rather than a market: the 2008 constitution treats use as a health matter and forbids criminalising users, but there is no legal supply and no safe amount since the 2023 repeal.[@lc,eu] The constitutional guarantee is traced in the [2008 constitution](/history/ecuador-constitution-2008/).

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high

Hemp is the licensed crop: below-1% THC cannabis excluded from control in 2019, grown under agriculture-ministry licences that drew commercial growers, with Agreement 109 setting seven licence classes for seed, sowing and production.[@pbp19,giq,mag109]

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Seizures run near thirty tons a year: 28,591 kg of herbal cannabis in 2024, up from 19,514 kg in 2023.[@unodc_szr] Possession cases since the 2023 repeal turn on convincing police and judges of personal use, with pre-trial detention in the mix for small-scale cases.[@lc,eu]

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