The Hemispheric Drug Strategy 2020 highlights that member states should establish and/or strengthen national drug observatories to develop national drug information systems, foster scientific research, and to generate, collect, organize, analyze, and disseminate information that is used as a basis for the development and implementation of evidence-based drug policies and strategies.

CICAD’s Inter-American Observatory on Drugs (known by its Spanish language acronym, OID) supports the development and strengthening of NDOs in Member States. According to the Hemispheric Plan of Action on Drugs 2021-2025, the OID helps NDOs develop and adopt quantitative and qualitative methodologies for data gathering that allow for the comparison of information among countries, establish and strengthen drug information networks, contribute to the Early Warning System for the Americas, publish annual reports on drug supply and drug demand, foster best practices and exchange of successful experiences in research, among others.