Spanish police discovered a cannabis plantation of about 415,000 plants in the northern region of Navarre and announced the find on Wednesday 13 April 2022.[1] The plantation spread across 11 fields with a combined area of 67 hectares (166 acres), which police called Europe’s biggest cannabis plantation.[1][2] The growers had presented the farm as a legal industrial-hemp operation, but police found it was growing cannabis for drug trafficking and processing into cannabidiol (CBD) products.[1][2]
About 50 tonnes of the plants were being dried in a warehouse for processing into CBD, and the owner had planned to export large quantities to Italy and Switzerland, the Guardia Civil said.[2] In their dried state the plants would have had a black-market value of about 30 million euros, rising to up to 100 million US dollars if processed into CBD or other derivatives, officers said.[1][2] The investigation began in mid-2021 when police discovered one of the fields.[2]
Three people were arrested, according to Reuters, while The Nomad Today reported five arrests.[1][2] The Foral Police of Navarre and the Guardia Civil carried out the operation jointly.[1]
