Where in the world are the countries most likely to legalise cannabis?

The UK, Australia, Germany and Mexico are among the countries most likely to legalise recreational cannabis, according to researchers in Portugal who have developed an algorithm to identify characteristics that suggest a nation might change its laws.

All the countries least likely to legalise cannabis were in Africa or Asia, with the exception of the Bahamas. They included Azerbaijan, Ethiopia and Syria.

The algorithm was created by LTPlabs, a management consultancy in Porto, Portugal, which says it could also be adapted to predict regulatory change in areas as varied as tobacco control, euthanasia and abortion.

It calculates the likelihood of liberalisation by comparing certain traits of each country with those that have already relaxed their laws – just two (Canada and Uruguay) in the case of recreational use, but 33 for medical cannabis.