The story
Liechtenstein adopted a new definition of prohibited cannabis on 4 December 2014, setting the line at an average total THC content of at least 1%.[1] The same amendment gave the Health Office an express power to permit cultivation, manufacture and marketing for research, medicine development and limited medical use.[1]
A clearer line for the plant
The 2004 amendment had excluded hemp varieties listed in the Swiss agricultural catalogue when their THC content did not exceed 0.3%.[2] That law made the variety and its concentration relevant to the distinction between an agricultural plant and controlled hemp.[2]
The replacement wording put cannabis-type narcotics with at least 1% average total THC into the prohibition on growing, manufacturing and putting drugs into circulation.[1] It appeared in the law gazette in January 2015, with commencement linked to the new medicines law.[1] That companion law specified 1 April 2015, subject to the referendum clause.[3]
Permission could serve medicine and science
The Health Office could issue exceptional permissions where no international agreement prevented them and the purpose was scientific research, medicine development or limited medical application.[1] Research institutes could also obtain permission to grow, acquire, store and use narcotics for their own needs.[1] The amendment therefore supplied named purposes and a responsible authority for controlled scientific work.[1]
Authorised growers and manufacturers had to report quarterly on their cultivated area and the types and quantities of drugs obtained, made or processed.[1] Doctors prescribing an authorised narcotic medicine outside its approved indications had to notify the Health Office within thirty days.[1] These were regulated activities with continuing obligations attached to permission.[1]
Ordinary drug offences continued
The revised offence of unauthorised cultivation or manufacture carried up to three years in prison or a criminal fine of up to 360 day units.[1] Unauthorised transfer to another person remained within the same ordinary offence provision.[1] Medical exceptions therefore sat alongside the continuing prohibition on recreational production and supply.[1]
Later records show the medical route in use
The 2025 accountability report recorded twenty exceptional Dronabinol/cannabis permissions that year.[4] It described applications usually made for severe chronic pain when other medicines were insufficient.[4] Those administrative records give a practical measure of the restricted route described in the Liechtenstein profile, while counting permissions rather than establishing how many individual patients received a product.[4]
Listed for context. No score change is recorded for Liechtenstein here.
References
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