On September 2, 2026, the Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office (MPF) in Acre issued Recommendations Nos. 4 and 5, addressed to the National Council on Drug Policy (CONAD) and the National Health Surveillance Agency (Anvisa). Drafted by prosecutors Lucas Costa Almeida Dias and Luidgi Merlo Paiva dos Santos, the recommendations propose the creation of working groups to gather information, hear from the various stakeholders involved, and formulate new parameters for the regulation of ayahuasca and DMT. Among the stakeholders explicitly mentioned are Indigenous peoples, traditional communities, religious groups, and ayahuasca-practicing groups. The two agencies have thirty days to indicate whether they will comply with the measures.
The initiative follows a public hearing held last November in Rio Branco, convened by the MPF itself to discuss government actions and omissions related to the protection and use of ayahuasca. The hearing brought together representatives of Indigenous peoples, ayahuasca-practicing religious groups, public agencies, law enforcement, researchers, and other stakeholders involved in the issue. More than just an isolated event, the hearing served as a catalyst for public debate and provided some of the material upon which the recommendations were based.
From a broader perspective, Recommendations Nos. 4 and 5 seek to translate some of the key issues and tensions that have accumulated over the past few years into an agenda directed at specific state agencies. In doing so, they reignite a problem that had been partially stabilized by the regulation of the religious use of ayahuasca two decades ago.
From Religious Protection to the Creation of Boundaries
The MPF’s recommendations come nearly 20 years after the final report of CONAD’s Ayahuasca Multidisciplinary Working Group (GMT) was drafted and signed on November 23, 2006. The group included experts from various fields and representatives of some of the main branches of the “Brazilian Ayahuasca Religions” at the time. Their work reaffirmed the legitimacy of the religious use of ayahuasca, invoking the principle of freedom of religion and conscience and the constitutional protection of Indigenous and Afro-Brazilian cultural expressions.
The solution developed at that time was innovative, involving a dialogue among state officials, experts, and representatives of ayahuasca-practicing groups. The GMT sought to establish the conditions under which certain practices could be recognized as religious and, therefore, protected. To this end, it drew distinctions regarding uses considered incompatible with such protection, such as commerce, tourism, advertising, proselytizing, and therapy (Antunes 2025).
The ethical principles formulated by the group reflect this approach. By recommending the absence of commercial purposes, limiting advertising, and entrusting the entities themselves with control mechanisms, the report helped shape a specific public image of religious use. Legal protection was thus linked to the establishment of boundaries. To recognize a practice as legitimate, it was also necessary to distinguish it from other forms of use.
This regulatory framework was subsequently incorporated into CONAD Resolution No. 1/2010 and formed a fundamental basis for the legal protection of the religious use of ayahuasca in the country. But every public policy has its limits. By defining more clearly what would be protected, the regulation also established the categories through which other practices would be evaluated.
The question that now arises is what happens when these categories must address a landscape that has become broader, more diverse, and harder to define.
New Tensions, New Issues
The regulations established by CONAD in 2006 were developed primarily through dialogue with religious groups, which, at that time, were the main public stakeholders on the issue of ayahuasca in the country. The debate centered on the conditions for recognizing and protecting religious use, and the Brazilian Ayahuasca Religions held a privileged position in negotiations with state institutions.
The Indigenous presence had not yet gained the same visibility in urban ayahuasca circles or in the public forums where its regulation was being discussed. The category of “religious use” could thus function as a relatively stable way of addressing the regulatory issue.
This configuration began to change throughout the 2000s. Indigenous leaders began to participate more actively in urban and transnational ayahuasca circles, organizing festivals, workshops, retreats, and ceremonies, and establishing relationships with researchers, members of ayahuasca-based religions, public officials, and Brazilian and foreign participants (Labate and Coutinho, 2014).
“As Indigenous leaders began to demand participation in discussions about ayahuasca, they also began to challenge the terms on which those discussions had been organized.”
The festivals held in Acre became important venues for this circulation, facilitating the transmission of knowledge, cultural exchange, political advocacy, and fundraising. The Yawanawá and Huni Kuin were among the first peoples to pursue these possibilities more systematically, turning these events into points of connection between villages, cities, and national and international circuits (Platero, 2026).
It is in this context that situations began to arise that did not easily fit within the regulatory framework established in 2006. The movement of Indigenous leaders carrying ayahuasca between villages, cities, and various networks began to involve seizures, detentions, and denials of boarding at airports, among other forms of administrative intervention.
These situations brought to light a dimension of the regulation that had remained less evident when the issue was framed primarily in terms of the religious use practiced by the organizations that had participated in its development. The issue was no longer merely about the conditions under which the state should protect a practice recognized as religious, it involved a multitude of situations in which the drink circulated, was presented, shared, and used.
The emergence of these problems also altered the composition of the public arena. The Indigenous presence did not simply represent the entry of new participants into an already established debate. As Indigenous leaders began to demand participation in discussions about ayahuasca, they also began to challenge the terms on which those discussions had been organized.
The regulatory issue, therefore, began to transform along with the circuits through which ayahuasca circulated. What had been constructed as a solution to a problem defined around religious use began to encounter situations that demanded other forms of classification, dialogue, and decision-making. It is in this mismatch between regulations built on a specific configuration of the field and the transformation of the relationships that constituted it that new tensions began to emerge.
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When Categories Come into Conflict
The issue, therefore, is not merely that new uses have emerged. The presence of the drink on commercial platforms, the proliferation of retreats and ceremonies, and its circulation across different countries and social contexts have created new situations in which the state is called upon to define what counts as religious, spiritual, therapeutic, traditional, or commercial use. Categories are not merely forms of description but objects of dispute.
The contemporary problem is not simply to establish where religion ends and therapy, commerce, or tourism begin. It is to understand how these categories are mobilized by different actors and institutions and what effects they produce when the state must decide on a specific situation.
“Ayahuasca is not merely a substance. It can be a religious practice, a cultural expression, a relationship with the environment, and a means of connecting with territories and communities.”
It is in this context that the MPF’s recommendations take on importance. By bringing into discussion situations that challenge existing classifications, they highlight the gap between a regulatory framework built around specific forms of use and the diversity of practices, actors, and contexts that have come to demand recognition and regulation.
The recommendations do more than simply respond to these situations. In doing so, they call into question the very categories upon which the state had been basing and guiding the process of regulating ayahuasca.
From Controversies to Recommendations
Recommendations Nos. 4 and 5 from the Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office address issues that existing regulations are no longer able to handle. One is directed at CONAD, the other at Anvisa. Both propose a working group, with a two-year timeline, to discuss the regulation of DMT for religious, spiritual, and therapeutic uses by traditional communities, religions, and ayahuasca-practicing groups. The difference lies in the responsibilities assigned to each agency.
CONAD would be responsible for gathering data, studies, standards, and input from interested individuals and organizations – especially Indigenous communities and Brazilian ayahuasca religions – and producing a report to inform future decisions on regulation. There is an important change here. Whereas in 2006 the discussion had been conducted primarily with religious organizations, now other stakeholders, especially Indigenous peoples, are being called upon to participate in the actual development of the regulations.
Recommendation No. 5, addressed to Anvisa, proposes updating the classification of DMT on the lists of psychotropic substances and creating mechanisms for consultation and public participation prior to the agency’s decisions. A change in this classification could reduce interventions based solely on the presence of the substance, but it would not resolve issues related to the cultivation of plants, the preparation of the drink, its distribution, or its commercialization.
The two recommendations therefore stem from the same problem but focus on different dimensions. One seeks to gather information, listen to different stakeholders, and establish parameters for ayahuasca. The other questions the classification of DMT. In practice, however, these dimensions are deeply intertwined.
The difficulty lies in regulating a beverage that simultaneously involves plants, knowledge, people, territories, and diverse forms of organization. Ayahuasca is not merely a substance. It can be a religious practice, a cultural expression, a relationship with the environment, and a means of connecting with territories and communities. For this reason, regulations centered on DMT alone cannot adequately address the relationships that underpin its production and circulation.
This multiplicity also broadens the legal arenas involved. In addition to religious freedom, Indigenous rights and human rights, international treaties, cultural heritage policies, environmental protection, and drug control policies come into play. Consequently, the range of stakeholders claiming a role in defining what should be regulated and protected also expands.
The recommendations also draw attention to the role of the state itself. Concerns regarding the training of law enforcement officers and the lack of anthropological and sociological knowledge in certain instances show that regulation depends not only on the rules themselves but also on how they are interpreted and applied in everyday life.
The same applies to self-regulation. In 2006, the ethical principles and internal mechanisms of religious organizations played a central role in organizing the religious use of ayahuasca. They remain relevant, but were formulated for a context different from the one that has taken shape in recent decades.
Between Recognition and Control
The recommendations do not create new regulations. They reopen the discussion on a solution that, since 2006, had seemed relatively settled.
At that time, legal protection was organized primarily around religious use, in consultation with the organizations at the center of the discussion. DMT, on the other hand, remained subject to drug laws.
Today, this division is proving more difficult to sustain. Not because the distinction between religion and other forms of use has disappeared, but because the circulation of ayahuasca has come to involve situations that do not easily fit into this classification.
“This is where the paradox arises. “The greater the recognition and legitimacy attributed to ayahuasca, the greater the demand for regulation, oversight, and control. Legal protection does not necessarily mean less state intervention.”
In this context, “regulating” does not simply mean establishing what can and cannot be done. It also means defining what will be recognized, who will be able to participate in that definition, and which practices will be considered legitimate.
Recommendations Nos. 4 and 5 make these choices more visible. Revising the legal framework for DMT may exclude DMT from the criminal justice system, but it may also shift the discussion toward the field of pharmacology and lead to the creation of other control mechanisms. Indigenous participation may expand the recognition of rights, but it may also require new forms of institutionalization. Greater state involvement may reduce arbitrariness, but it may also create new bureaucratic obstacles.
This is where the paradox arises. The greater the recognition and legitimacy attributed to ayahuasca, the greater the demand for regulation, oversight, and control. Legal protection does not necessarily mean less state intervention. It may mean its expansion into new domains.
Therefore, the issue is no longer simply about protecting ayahuasca. It is about deciding what should be protected, who participates in that decision, and how the state should intervene. The recommendations do not resolve the problem. After nearly two decades, they show that what seemed settled in 2006 has once again become a matter of dispute.
References
Antunes, H. F. (2025). Religion, Drug or Cult? Ayahuasca’s Legal Path in Brazil, the United States and France. Springer Publisher.
Labate, B. C. & Coutinho, F. (2014). “O meu avô deu a ayahuasca para o Mestre Irineu”: reflexões sobre a entrada dos índios no circuito urbano de consumo de ayahuasca no Brasil. Revista de Antropologia USP, vol. 57, nº 2, pp. 215-250.
Platero, L. D. (2026). Virando indígena, virando Yawanawás. Mercado de Letras.
