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Edibles, extracts and topicals could bring in millions of consumers, many of them ‘canna-curious,’ but Canadian producers will face challenges.

Canadian Cannabis 2.0 is here! It’s been over a year since recreational cannabis was legalized for adult use in Canada, and with the edibles, extracts and topicals category recently legalized, the market is shifting into what many envision as a new wave of consumption. How will the introduction of these new products impact the market?

Let’s start with Cannabis 1.0.

Since 1999, after intense lobbying from unions representing French farmers, the THC limit for European hemp has been capped at 0.2%. Yet two decades hence, that standard is being blamed for negatively impacting the viability of the European hemp industry.

Former vice president Joe Biden on Monday backed away from his previous assertion that marijuana may be a “gateway drug,” saying he has seen no evidence that use of the drug could lead to dependence on other, more powerful substances.

MADISON, Wis. -- Gov. Tony Evers on Tuesday signed into law a bipartisan bill that makes Wisconsin's hemp-growing program permanent as it continues to surge in popularity in just its second year.

Hailed by supporters as Wisconsin's "comeback crop," hemp is seeing renewed popularity in large part because of the growth in the market for CBD, a legal, therapeutic compound extracted from the cannabis plant that marketers say can treat a range of ailments without getting users high. It's widely marketed in oils, lotions and foods.

Cannabis stocks were slammed anew on Tuesday, after the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued new guidance on CBD that included a stark warning that it can cause liver injury and other damage to the human body.

The warning is the latest blow to the embattled sector where many companies have developed strategies and plans for the cannabis ingredient, which was viewed by Canadian licensed players as a potential pathway into the much bigger U.S. market.

“Not so fast,” wrote MKM analyst Bill Kirk. “The FDA’s statement includes some balloon-bursting language.”

Rules are not made to be broken. The principles that underpin the development and use of therapies from cannabis are not to be “juggled”. Globally, we are now seeing the calamity caused by breaking these rules. The list of examples is long. These include using cheaper, fake ingredients in products, mixing cannabis flowers with lookalike plants, selling “mould-ridden” plants to clients, and peddling fake certificates of analysis.

Now that legal marijuana is on hold in New Jersey, state leaders are privately discussing a plan to decriminalize marijuana in the meantime and put an end to arrests for pot possession, NJ Advance Media has learned.

Murphy's Law appears to have hit Canadian marijuana stocks in a major way in recent months. Nearly everything that could go wrong has gone wrong.

Canada's heaviest populated province, Ontario, has only 24 retail cannabis stores open more than a year after the country's adult-use recreational marijuana market launched. Most cannabis companies continue to hemorrhage cash. Revenue is growing more slowly than anticipated if it's growing at all.

This year was not especially auspicious to CEOs. As of October 2019, a record number of 172 CEOs from companies that included Nike, WeWork and Under Armor, left their posts. The legal cannabis industry was not immune from this CEO-apocalypse.

Six of the 18 states that have legalized legalize adult use or medicinal cannabis since 2016 have made diversity measures part of their program. 

Data released in August 2019 by Marijuana Business Daily found that states are warming to social equity measures in cannabis.

With less than half of the states to legalize cannabis in the last three years to enact social equity measures, the concern is warranted.