This article originally appeared in High Times’ 50th Anniversary print issue. Get yours here.
In the 1970s, Colombia’s Sierra Nevada became the source of the world’s most famous cannabis. Then Washington’s War on Drugs destroyed the trade and helped create the cocaine cartels that replaced it.
The Bonanza in Numbers
Colombia’s first cannabis economy, at a glance.
80%
Sierra and La Guajira campesinos dependent on cannabis by 1975
150,000
Colombians directly or indirectly linked to the cannabis economy (1979)
3,500 t
Cannabis seized in Operation Fulminante (1979)
25,000
Acres of cannabis crops destroyed in the same operation
Back in the 70s, before cannabis prohibition and the U.S. crackdown turned Latin America’s jungle-green leaves red, there was a time defined by vibrance, transformative power and cultural surge, fueled by tons of weed money flowing from North American pockets into Colombia’s Sierra Nevada. That period, which saw the Santa Marta region rise as an empire built on cannabis, is known as La Bonanza Marimbera. It is the subject of an upcoming documentary by producer Lucas Nosiglia and director Guido Mignogna. Nosiglia is also working with cannabis legend Sergio Puerta on multiple initiatives to revitalize cannabis culture and production in the region.
El Corazón del Mundo, to be presented in 2026, tells the story of those crazy, vibrant years, showcasing how that ever-changing agricultural landscape became the theater of operations for one of the most violent and cruel chapters in the history of drug prohibition, and how those years echo in today’s revival of cannabis production in Colombia.
The Real OGs Are Actually Campesinos
In the late 60s and 70s, the lush slopes of Sierra Nevada became the unlikely epicenter of a new transnational economy. What had been a relatively isolated agricultural frontier of maize, plantain and coffee, turned into the source of …
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Author: Rolando García / High Times
