Marijuana

Marijuana (spelled marihuana in older US statutes) is the legal and popular name for drug-type cannabis — Cannabis sativa grown for its intoxicating THC content. Chemically it is the same species as hemp; the difference is potency and, with it, legal status.

Under the US Controlled Substances Act (21 U.S.C. § 802(16)), 'marihuana' means the cannabis plant and its parts, but the 2018 Farm Bill carved out hemp — cannabis with 0.3% delta-9 THC or less — from that definition. What remains above the line is listed in Schedule I (21 U.S.C. § 812), the category the law reserves for substances with a high potential for abuse and 'no currently accepted medical use' — even as state-level legalisation widens.

Internationally the picture is shifting: in 2020 the UN removed cannabis from the strictest schedule of the 1961 Single Convention (see delisted), while keeping it controlled. The hemp/marijuana split is therefore the foundational distinction this Atlas tracks — the same plant, sorted by a fraction of a percent of one molecule.