Vanuatu’s appeal court separates personal growing from commercial crops

Vanuatu’s appeal court set out three broad categories for sentencing cannabis growers on 26 July 2013. Small personal grows generally called for fines or other community measures, while cultivation for profit brought prison starting points measured in years.^[1][2]

A wide penalty range needed practical guidance

The drug law’s general penalty gave courts a broad choice of punishment, from a fine to twenty years in prison. The appeal judges said they were responding to increased cultivation and dealing, particularly crops grown on the islands for sale.^[1]

They distinguished three kinds of growing, according to purpose and scale. Plant numbers and sizes mattered, but the judges warned that these could be an imperfect guide where intensive methods were used to increase the usable yield or strength of the crop.^[1]

For a person before the court, the reason for growing therefore mattered alongside what police had counted or weighed.^[1]

Personal growing differed from a commercial crop

The first category covered a small number of plants grown for the offender’s own use, with no sale occurring or intended. Fines or other measures outside prison were the usual response. Unpaid supply, more serious circumstances or persistent offending could justify a greater penalty, community work, supervision or a short prison term.^[1]

The second category concerned small commercial grows intended to make a profit. The normal starting point was two to four years, although very limited or infrequent sales could justify less. Large commercial operations, often organised and sophisticated, generally started at four years or more.^[1]

A starting point is the judge’s assessment of the offending before adjustments for the person’s circumstances and guilty plea.^[3]

Wetul’s own sentence was suspended

Wetul had grown nine plants for commercial purposes, averaging 2.7 metres tall and weighing 6.8 kilograms in total. His immediate sentence of two years four months was replaced with seven months suspended for two years, alongside supervision and community work.^[3]

The suspension meant the sentence would not require immediate imprisonment. Later courts continued to apply the categories when deciding how to punish other growers.^[1][2]

Later cases showed different consequences

In 2017, Roro Iauko received sixty hours of community service for plants grown as a pest barrier. The court placed his case at the lower end of the first category.^[2]

In 2024, a five-plant case ended with a suspended sentence after the grower had already spent more than three months in custody before bail.^[4] Those distinctions inform Vanuatu’s current profile and its account of criminal cultivation.