# Landraces of the world: an overview

> Drug-type cannabis landraces developed across South and Central Asia and were carried to Africa, the Middle East and the Americas, where local farmers adapted them over centuries. Genomic work points to an Asian origin of domestication (exact region contested). Many traditional landraces are now endangered by hybrid replacement, and most 'landrace' seed in commerce is better described as heirloom: collected at some point, then maintained elsewhere. Every origin story here is a claim; this article labels the evidence.

- Canonical: https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/genetics-history/landraces-of-the-world.html
- Category: Genetics history · Level: Intermediate
- Evidence: Supported · Status: Draft: awaiting expert review (some figures are being checked)
- Stage: Any stage · Systems: Any system
- Updated: 2026-10-31 · Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/), attribute "GenetixBay Knowledge Base (genetixbay.com/knowledge)"

## Questions and answers

**What are the main cannabis landraces?** The main cannabis landraces fall into two broad drug-type groups. South Asian-derived narrow-leaflet, long-flowering types grow across India, Southeast Asia, Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America. Central Asian broad-leaflet hashish types come from Afghanistan, northwest Pakistan and parts of Central Asia. Regional lines such as Thai, Colombian, Mexican, Jamaican and Moroccan types sit within these groups.

**Where did cannabis originate?** Cannabis originated in Asia, though the exact region is contested. A 2021 study resequencing 110 [accessions](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/accession.md) concluded it was first domesticated in East Asia in the early Neolithic. Critics note most basal samples came from Xinjiang or Qinghai, often counted as Central Asia, and key regions went unsampled. The older view places the origin in Central Asia.

**What is an Afghani landrace?** An Afghani landrace is a Central Asian broad-leaflet hashish type from Afghanistan, the Hindu Kush and northwest Pakistan. Farmers sieving resin for hashish selected short, compact, early (about 7 to 9 weeks) and resin-heavy plants, often with [sesquiterpene](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/sesquiterpene.md) alcohols such as guaiol. That selection is the root of every 'Afghani' and 'Kush' in modern hybrids. Botanists call it var. afghanica.

**Are landraces still pure?** Landraces are not reliably pure today. Taxonomists describe traditional high-THC domesticates as endangered, with about 50 years of hybridising having obliterated differences between them, and in Morocco traditional kif has largely given way to introduced hybrids. Landraces were never uniform anyway; they vary a lot within a population, and mid-20th-century exports often mixed regions.

**Which landraces are sativa and which are indica?** In grower terms, the South Asian-derived landraces of India, Thailand and Southeast Asia, Africa, Jamaica, Mexico and Colombia are the narrow-leaflet 'sativa' types, and Afghan and Hindu Kush hashish landraces are the broad-leaflet 'indica' types. Formal botany flips this, naming them var. indica and var. afghanica. Both labels describe plant shape and flowering time, not separate species.

**Are landrace seeds sold online real landraces?** Most landrace seed sold online is better described as [heirloom](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/heirloom.md): collected at some point, then grown and selected for years in another country, with [bottlenecks](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/genetic-bottleneck.md) and sometimes cross-pollination. A true landrace is a farmer-maintained population in its home region. A country name in a strain name is not proof of origin; look for collection place, date, collector and maintenance history.

**Short answer.** Cannabis was domesticated in Asia, then spread with people for fibre, seed and resin. Drug-type landraces fall into two broad historical groups: **South Asian-derived** narrow-leaflet types (India, Southeast Asia, Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America), and **Central Asian** broad-leaflet hashish types (Afghanistan, Pakistan's northwest, parts of Central Asia) [2][3]. Many are endangered, and most "landrace" seed sold today is heirloom material with a history of its own [2].

## Where it began

- **Ren et al. (2021)** resequenced 110 accessions and concluded cannabis was first domesticated in **East Asia** in the early Neolithic, with modern hemp and drug cultivars descending from an ancestral [gene pool](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/gene-pool.md) now represented by feral plants and landraces in China [1] (*Supported*, with criticism).
- **Critique:** most "basal" samples came from Xinjiang or Qinghai, which many define as Central Asia, and key regions (Russia, Afghanistan) were unsampled [7]. The older view places origin in Central Asia [3][6]. Treat the exact region as *Contested*; an Asian origin is well supported.

## The two drug-type groups

McPartland and Small (2020) classified high-THC domesticates using 1,100 herbarium specimens and literature meta-analysis [2]:

| Group (common name) | Formal name proposed [2] | Typical traits | [THC](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/thc.md):[CBD](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/cbd.md) |
|---|---|---|---|
| South Asian ("Sativa" in popular use) | *[C. sativa](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/cannabis-sativa.md)* subsp. *indica* var. *indica* | Narrow [leaflets](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/leaflet.md), tall, long flowering, little or no sesquiterpene alcohols | ≥7 |
| Central Asian ("Indica" in popular use) | *C. sativa* subsp. *indica* var. *afghanica* | Broad leaflets, short, early, sesquiterpene alcohols (e.g., guaiol, eudesmols) present, hashish tradition | <7 |

Yes, this flips the popular labels, which is part of why taxonomists and growers talk past each other. See [indica, sativa and ruderalis](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/genetics-history/indica-sativa-ruderalis.md).

## A regional overview

All lineage and origin statements below are **claims** at roughly L1 (community and ethnobotanical reports) unless a citation says otherwise. Dates are approximate.

| Region | Traditional use | Commonly reported traits | Evidence notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Afghanistan, Hindu Kush, northwest Pakistan | Sieved hashish (charas in some areas) | Broad leaflets, compact, early flowering (~7-9 weeks), resinous | Central Asian group *Supported* [2][3]; individual seed lines' origins L1 |
| India and Nepal (Himalayan foothills) | Hand-rubbed charas, ganja | Mixed; foothill types narrow-leaflet, long flowering | Region-level *Supported* [2][3]; feral populations widespread |
| Southeast Asia (Thailand, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam) | Ganja | Very long flowering (12-16+ weeks), tall, narrow leaflets | *Supported* [3]; heavy loss from hybrid replacement reported [2] |
| Africa (South Africa, Malawi, Congo, Ethiopia, Morocco) | Ganja and dagga; Moroccan hashish | Southern and central types narrow-leaflet, long flowering; modern Moroccan crop now largely hybrid | Arrival via Arab and Indian Ocean trade *Supported* [3]; Moroccan hybrid replacement L1 |
| Middle East (Lebanon) | Sieved hashish | Variable | L1 |
| Caribbean (Jamaica) | Ganja, introduced with indentured South Asian labour in the 19th century | Narrow leaflet, long flowering | Introduction route *Supported* [3] |
| Mexico and Central America | Ganja (export era 1960s-70s) | Narrow leaflet, long flowering | Spread history *Supported* [3]; named regional lines (e.g., from specific states) L1 |
| Colombia | Export ganja 1960s-70s | Narrow leaflet, long flowering | *Supported* as history [3] |
| Brazil | Traditional use in the northeast | Narrow leaflet | L1 |
| Northern and Central Asia, Eastern Europe (feral, "[ruderalis](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/ruderalis.md)") | Wild/feral; hemp | Small, early, often [day-neutral](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/autoflower.md) | Source of autoflowering trait *Supported* as claim [4] |

## Credit where it's due

Nearly every modern line, whatever its catalogue name, is built on plants selected over centuries by farmers who never got a seed-bank credit. GenetixBay's position is that they deserve far more of it.

- **Afghanistan and the Hindu Kush** (Mazar-i-Sharif, Balkh and the northern provinces; the mountain valleys into northwest Pakistan, including Chitral): farmers who sieve dried plants for resin and press it into hashish selected short, early, broad-leaflet, resin-heavy plants. That selection is the root of every "Afghani" and "Kush" in modern hybrids [2][3][11].
- **The Himalaya: Nepal and the Indian hills** (Darchula, the Parvati Valley, Malana): smallholders hand-rub charas from living plants and keep their own seed, alongside fibre and seed uses [3][9][11].
- **India's ganja growers:** by the 1890s, where ganja was carefully managed, female plants "often receive special care and have the males removed" [8]. That is [sinsemilla](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/glossary/sinsemilla.md), practised and understood long before the word reached Western growers.
- **Morocco's Rif and Lebanon's Bekaa:** kif and sieved hashish traditions that ran whole regional economies [3][10][11].
- **Thailand, Colombia, Mexico, Jamaica, central and southern Africa:** the long-flowering narrow-leaflet lines that gave modern hybrids their "sativa" side [2][3].

Credit isn't only history. McPartland and Small describe these domesticates as **endangered**, with 50 years of hybridising having "obliterated differences" between them [2]; in Morocco, traditional kif has largely given way to introduced high-yielding hybrids [10]. Preserving and documenting what's left is why GenetixBay exists. See [old cannabis wasn't weak](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/genetics-history/old-cannabis-was-not-weak.md), [why everything tastes the same](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/genetics-history/why-everything-tastes-the-same.md) and [patents and the gene pool](https://genetixbay.com/knowledge/genetics-history/patents-and-the-gene-pool.md).

## Landrace vs heirloom in your seed catalogue

A landrace is a farmer-maintained population in its region [5]. Seed collected decades ago and grown since in another country has been through new selection, bottlenecks and sometimes cross-pollination. GenetixBay records these as heritage lines with:

- collection place and date (claim, with evidence level);
- who collected it and how many seeds or plants;
- how it has been maintained since (population size, isolation).

## Common mistakes

- Treating a country name in a strain name as proof of origin.
- Assuming landraces are uniform. They vary a lot within a population.
- Assuming old means pure. Mid-20th-century exports often mixed regions.

## Evidence

- Asian origin of domestication: *Supported*; exact region *Contested* [1][7].
- Two broad drug-type groups (South Asian and Central Asian): *Supported* [2][3][4].
- Endangered status of traditional landraces: *Supported* [2].
- Regional trait descriptions: *Grower practice* / ethnobotanical reports, labelled per row.

## Sources

1. Ren G, Zhang X, Li Y, et al. 2021. Large-scale whole-genome resequencing unravels the domestication history of Cannabis sativa. Science Advances 7(29):eabg2286. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abg2286
2. McPartland JM, Small E. 2020. A classification of endangered high-THC cannabis (Cannabis sativa subsp. indica) domesticates and their wild relatives. PhytoKeys 144:81-112. https://doi.org/10.3897/phytokeys.144.46700
3. Clarke RC, Merlin MD. 2013. Cannabis: Evolution and Ethnobotany. University of California Press. https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520292482/cannabis
4. Hillig KW. 2005. Genetic evidence for speciation in Cannabis (Cannabaceae). Genetic Resources and Crop Evolution 52:161-180. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10722-003-4452-y
5. Villa TCC, Maxted N, Scholten M, Ford-Lloyd B. 2005. Defining and identifying crop landraces. Plant Genetic Resources 3(3):373-384. https://doi.org/10.1079/PGR200591
6. Small E. 2015. Evolution and classification of Cannabis sativa (marijuana, hemp) in relation to human utilization. Botanical Review 81:189-294. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12229-015-9157-3
7. McPartland J. Was cannabis first grown in eastern China? (commentary). BeyondTHC. https://beyondthc.com/was-cannabis-first-grown-in-eastern-china/
8. Indian Hemp Drugs Commission. 1894. Report of the Indian Hemp Drugs Commission, 1893-94, chapter V (cultivation of ganja; removal of male plants). https://deriv.nls.uk/dcn9/7443/74434811.9.htm
9. Clarke RC. 2007. Traditional Cannabis cultivation in Darchula District, Nepal: seed, resin and textiles. Journal of Industrial Hemp 12(2):19-42.
10. Chouvy P-A, Afsahi K. 2014. Hashish revival in Morocco. International Journal of Drug Policy 25(3):416-423. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.drugpo.2014.01.001
11. Clarke RC. 1998. Hashish! Red Eye Press, Los Angeles (updated edition 2010).