Opium
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Opium is the dried latex obtained from the seed capsules of the opium poppy Papaver somniferum. Approximately 12 percent of opium is made up of the analgesic alkaloid morphine, which is processed chem
Opium poppy seed pod exuding latex from a cut
Poppy crop from the Malwa in India (probably Papaver somniferum var. album)
Goddess of Ecstasy figurine from Crete, dated around the Late Bronze Age
Opium users in Java during the Dutch colonial period, c. 1870
The Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs, 1961 is an international treaty that controls activities involving specific narcotic drugs and lays down a system of regulations for their medical and scientif
Article 44 of the Convention terminated a number of previous drug control treaties.
Governments of opium-producing Parties are required to "purchase and take physical possession of such crops as soon as possible" after harvest to prevent diversion into the illicit market.
The Single Convention was the first international treaty to establish a narrow system of drug control for cannabis.
Articles 23 and 28 of the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs require cannabis-producing nations to have a government agency that controls cultivation.