Before the creation of the League, there existed an international Convention – the Hague Opium Convention of 1912 – that never entered into force. The signatories of the Treaty of Versailles agreed by Art. 295 to ratify it, ipso facto. The 1912 Convention imposed, for the first time, certain obligations for regulating the trade in and production of drugs, on the contracting parties. The League subsequently appointed an Advisory Committee, and instructed the Secretariat to collect full information on the steps taken to apply the 1912 Convention.
