HOLLAND might be considered the cannabis capital of Europe but a new study shows Irish people smoke just as much marijuana as our Dutch neighbours.

A study carried out by the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction reports 25.3 per cent of Irish people have smoked cannabis at some stage in their life.

While in Holland, where the drug is legal and widely available to the public, 25.7 per cent of people surveyed between the ages of 15 – 64 said they have tried the drug.

The European Drug Report 2013 also shows Irish people are among the highest users of cocaine on the continent with seven per cent of the population claiming to have tried the banned substance.

The only countries to rank above Ireland for cocaine use are the United Kingdom and Spain even the Netherlands have significantly less use of the drug at 5.5 per cent of the population saying they tried it.

The survey of 5,128 Irish people reported seven per cent of people have tried ecstasy and 4.4 per cent have used hallucinogenic drug LSD.