| National Cannabis Prevention and Information Centre | |
|---|---|
| Abbreviation | NCPIC |
| Formation | 29 April 2008 |
| Type | GO |
| Legal status | National centre |
| Location | Sydney, Australia |
| Region served | Australia |
| Director | Prof. Jan Copeland |
| Parent organization | National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre |
| Staff | 19 |
| Website | http://ncpic.org.au/ |
The National Cannabis Prevention and Information Centre or NCPIC, is an Australian centre funded by the Commonwealth Department of Health and Ageing.
Its mission is to reduce the use of cannabis in Australia by preventing uptake and harms associated with its use in the Australian community.
The key goals of the Centre are:
It is administered by the University of New South Wales, and is located on the university's Randwick campus in Sydney, Australia.
The Centre was officially opened in 2008 and represents a consortium of organisations from around the country, led by the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre (NDARC).
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On 15 May 2006 the Australian State and Territory governments endorsed the first National Cannabis Strategy (2006–2009) at a meeting of the Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy in Perth, Western Australia.[1] Christopher Pyne, then the Australian Government's Parliamentary Secretary for Health, welcomed the endorsement and later confirmed that the Australian Government had committed A$14 million over four years to establish a "National Cannabis Control and Prevention Centre".[2]
Just over a year later, as the Minister for Ageing, Pyne announced that a national consortium led by the National Drug and Alcohol Research Centre (NDARC) had been selected to establish the centre.[3] It was eventually named the National Cannabis Prevention and Information Centre and was officially opened on Tuesday 29 April 2008 by the new Minister for Health and Ageing, Nicola Roxon in a ceremony held at the Justice and Police Museum in Sydney.
Australian media coverage was received by the centre following the release of its first two publications, the NCPIC Bulletin and the Criminal Justice Bulletin. Both publications continue to be produced on an irregular basis.
The first NCPIC Bulletin discussed a new trend that Australian teenage girls’ cannabis use now matches that of their male counterparts despite the rates of recent cannabis use among 14 to 39-year-olds continuing to decline since 1998.[4] It also revealed some results of a NCPIC study that males represent 72.5% of cannabis related presentations arriving at emergency departments in two Sydney hospitals studied between 2004 and 2006. These topics are typical of those covered by the publication.
The first Criminal Justice Bulletin highlighted the finding that most of Australia’s cannabis is grown hydroponically, in urban areas, rather than in outdoor bush-crops. Hydroponic plantations are seen by growers as easier to conceal and as producing better yields than bush crops. These reasons, coupled with the hydroponic industry’s high profitability, means it is unlikely to slow in the short to medium term.[5][6]
The National Cannabis Prevention and Information Centre was established in response to growing community concerns about cannabis use, particularly amongst young people.
According to the Australian Government's National Cannabis Strategy (2006–2009), there are a range of health and social harms associated with cannabis use which the centre aims to reduce. In recent times there has also been a marked increase in presentations to specialist alcohol and other drug treatment services for problems associated with use of the drug. According to the National Minimum Data Set of clients of specialised alcohol and other drug treatment services (2005–2006), alcohol is the most common principal drug of concern reported in closed treatment episodes (39%), with cannabis being the most commonly reported illicit drug (25% of cases).[7]
In response to these challenges, the NCPIC mission is to reduce the use of cannabis in Australia by preventing uptake and providing the community with evidence-based information and interventions.