Germany cements Europe's largest medical cannabis market: lessons for LatAm exporters

Germany has cemented itself as the reference market for medical cannabis in Europe. With close to 84 million inhabitants, a health system with practically universal coverage, and a regulatory framework that opened prescribing broadly from April 2024, the country concentrates the bulk of European demand and operates as a gateway to the rest of the continent. For Latin American exporters —particularly from Uruguay and Colombia, which have already begun shipments to that destination— understanding the architecture of the German market is decisive when assessing supply opportunities.

The change in scale is not a recent phenomenon, but it did accelerate after the Cannabis Act (CanG) came into force in 2024. The reform altered the product's legal classification and, with it, the prescribing, import, and distribution conditions that had constrained the growth of the medical segment for years.

The Cannabis Act (CanG) and the opening of prescribing

The element that has had the greatest impact on market volume is the reclassification of medical cannabis within the German legal framework. Until April 2024, the product was subject to the narcotics regime, which imposed demanding administrative requirements on both the prescribing physician and the distribution chain. With the entry into force of the Cannabis Act (CanG) —Germany's cannabis law— medical cannabis ceased to be regulated under that more restrictive framework, which significantly simplified the act of prescribing.

In practical terms, this meant that a broader universe of professionals could prescribe without the prior documentary burdens, and that the flow of patients into the regulated channel grew quickly. Coverage by Cannabis Law Report and Cannabis Europa has documented this inflection point as the main driver of the expansion of German demand in 2024 and 2025.

The opening of prescribing also has an effect on the market's predictability: as administrative barriers are reduced, demand behavior becomes more sensitive to product availability and to importers' supply capacity, rather than being bounded by regulatory friction. This shifts the bottleneck from regulation toward logistics and pharmaceutical quality.

GKV reimbursement and market size

A second structural factor is the insurance system. Most of the German population is covered by mandatory health insurance (Gesetzliche Krankenversicherung, GKV —the statutory health insurance scheme). Within that scheme there are reimbursement mechanisms that, under certain conditions, allow the cost of medical cannabis treatment to be borne by the insurer and not solely by the patient. The combination of a population base of close to 84 million people with a broad reimbursement system generates a potential demand that is hard to match in other European markets.

The projections compiled by GlobeNewswire place the German medical cannabis market on a trajectory of sustained growth, with estimates pointing to a value on the order of EUR 3.5 billion by 2028. Market projection figures come from third-party reports and should be read as consultancy estimates, not official data; the methodological detail of each projection should be verified in the corresponding source. [VERIFICAR FUENTE]

What is relevant for an exporter is not the aggregate value itself, but what that value implies: a market large enough to absorb significant volumes of imported product on a recurring basis, with a final buyer whose ability to pay is backed, in part, by the insurance system. That demand stability is an uncommon asset in the international medical cannabis landscape.

The commercial Pillar 2 and the next regulatory phase

The Cannabis Act was structured into differentiated components. Beyond the medical axis and home cultivation and clubs for adult use, the framework contemplates a second pillar —usually referred to as Pillar 2— oriented toward regulated commercial schemes, whose implementation is projected to roll out gradually. The discussion about opening that commercial pillar during 2026 has been followed by the specialized press as a factor that could modify the composition of demand and the structure of the supply chain.

For Latin American exporters, tracking this phase is important for a concrete reason: any expansion of the commercial framework may alter product requirements, the authorized channels, and the permitted volumes. The progress of Pillar 2 and its effective timeline should be verified in German regulatory communications and in specialized media tracking, given that the implementation deadlines for this type of reform tend to be adjusted during their legislative process. [VERIFICAR FUENTE]

Recent regulatory tightening and Portugal's role

The expansion of the German market has not been free of adjustments. After the accelerated growth following 2024, there have been reports of signs of tightening in the control of certain practices, in particular around the telemedicine and remote-prescribing models that had eased patient access. This type of regulatory correction is common when a market grows quickly: the regulator intervenes to curb practices perceived as evasive without reversing the underlying opening. Coverage by Cannabis Law Report and Cannabis Europa has tracked these measures, whose specific scope should be checked against each regulatory update.

In parallel, Portugal has consolidated its role as a logistics and production hub for European supply. The country has cultivation capacity under pharmaceutical standards and export infrastructure that positions it as a point of entry or intermediate processing toward markets such as Germany. For a Latin American exporter, this defines two possible routes of insertion: direct shipment to licensed German importers, or supplying operators established in Portugal that re-export or transform product within the European space. The customs destination, in this scenario, does not always coincide with the final consumption market.

Reading for Latin American exporters

The entry of importers from Uruguay and Colombia into the German market confirms that the barrier is no longer primarily one of access, but of compliance. Germany requires that imported product conform to strict pharmaceutical standards, which shifts the demand toward traceability, origin documentation, and batch consistency. The Latin American origins that have managed to ship are those that structured their operation around those requirements from the cultivation stage.

The German case therefore offers a useful reference for any market assessment: a large-scale destination, with demand backed by the insurance system, but with quality requirements that filter suppliers. The combination of scale and regulatory filter is precisely what makes it attractive and, at the same time, difficult to approach without preparation.

For companies assessing development and supply opportunities in medical cannabis toward Europe, tracking the German framework —Cannabis Act, evolution of Pillar 2, and regulatory adjustments— is a central input for the entry decision. CannaTech supports that analysis with regulatory and market-development advisory, oriented toward translating destination requirements into concrete compliance and supply criteria.

Sources

• Cannabis Europa
• Cannabis Law Report
• GlobeNewswire