Criminals who make drugs want to get rid of the waste that comes from the illegal drug labs. They dispose of the chemical waste in a public place, for example along the road or in a forest. We call this dumping of drug waste. Drug waste dumping is illegal and therefore punishable. The waste itself is very toxic and if it leaks into the soil, it is extremely polluting. If it is not cleaned up, dumping entails far-reaching risks for nature, humans and animals.
Our problem at hand is the growing dumping of drugs waste in Limburg and possibly the Euregion (border NL, BE. DLD).

Our main question this year is how to raise a dialogue on the illegal use of hard drugs with the goal of reducing the demand among young people. What strategy and message can have a real impact for this target group? Who do we need to involve in order to achieve this impact?

We would like the PREMIUM students to dive into the world of illegal drugs use. Within the Netherlands, maybe also because of our “gedoogbeleid” (toleration policy) that started with soft drugs, the use of (hard)drugs is nowadays also almost normal. When you go to a dance party there are drugs around. Why pay a lot of money for alcoholic beverages if you get into the right mode with a party drug?

Drugs lords who produce in Limburg (and also dump their chemical waste) make a lot of criminal money, and this money creates a “shadow economy” due to money laundering etc.

If we, the National Police of the Netherlands, have the aim and goal to stop this “Ondermijning” (subversion). It probably cannot be very successful if the demand for illegal hard drugs keeps growing and growing. Some voices say we should then also legalise the use of hard drugs (so more tolerance), that is NOT what we are looking for in this project. We want you to research ways to reduce demand, because without demand there is no supply (and no production).

In this project we want to understand WHAT DOES WORK in preventing drugs use? How can we, or other Limburg stakeholders, influence demand? What should be our strategy? Can you help us understand better why drugs use among students is (probably) normalised? What can we learn from different counties and the way they are coping with this issue? What does the average Maastricht student think on this topic? What suggestions do they have for us? We need your help!

The Netherlands has one national police force that is comprised of ten regional units, and one central unit tasked with specialised duties. The Netherlands Police have 65,000 employees: 51,000 police officers and 14,000 employees who fulfil other roles supporting police work. On this page you can read what we stand for and see how you can recognize us.

The mission of the Dutch National Police is: vigilant and subservient to the values of the rule of law. This mission is fulfilled by the police by providing solicited and unsolicited protection, limitation or validation, depending on the situation.
The police wants to achieve its mission by:

• building confidence in the way it achieves results;
• to act alertly and decisively in every situation;
• to work in a de-escalating way and to use violence where necessary;
• to work intensively with citizens and partners on the basis of involvement, sharing information and reciprocity;
• to learn, innovate and rely on its professionals;
• to be one ‘corps’ (body): from neighbourhood to world. Locally anchored and (inter) nationally connected.

The topic of ‘Ondermijning’, and in this project the fight against illegal production of synthetic drugs, is one of the biggest current priorities within the Dutch Police. Our aim is to fight organised crime and prevent its consequences for our society (economy, environment, politics etc.)