Belgian customs intercepted 19,339 kg of cannabis at the Port of Antwerp between January and early November 2025, a record that dwarfed the 336 kg seized in all of 2024.[1][2] Officers made the seizures across 13 operations, four of them involving hauls of more than three tonnes each; twelve of the shipments came from Canada and one from Thailand.[1][2][3] Customs figures later put the full-year 2025 marijuana total at 21 tonnes, alongside nearly 55 tonnes of cocaine.[4][5][6]

Finance spokesman Francis Adyns said most shipments arrive by sea through Antwerp, largely from Canada, but also by air cargo, courier and postal services and in passengers’ luggage.[1] National drug coordinator Charlotte Colman linked the flow to overproduction in countries that legalised cannabis for their domestic markets, with surplus diverted into international trafficking.[1] Canada, the United States and Thailand have legalised cannabis to varying degrees, but only for domestic markets.[1][2]

Belgian authorities recorded a marked rise in smuggling of the drug since Canada legalised cannabis in 2018.[6] Once inside Europe, the cannabis can be sold for nearly 10 times its price, depending on the location, since cannabis remains illegal in most European Union countries.[6] Customs found the shipments hidden in a container of a family’s personal effects, in gutted bran crates fitted out inside, and in vacuum-packed, labelled bags sent by sea.[6] Only 1 to 2 per cent of containers at Antwerp are inspected, using sniffer dogs, scanners, artificial intelligence or staff intuition.[6] The port handles 13.5 million containers a year.[6] Belgium appointed Ine Van Wymersch as commissioner in charge of the fight against drugs, and she asked Canada for closer cooperation on the problem she called glocal.[6] Europol said the profitability of North American cannabis, due to its high potency and low production cost, combined with European demand, “guarantees that this illicit trade will probably persist”.[6]