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The cannabis industry has been on a rollercoaster ride this year. Most of the cannabis companies have shown positive growth in 2019. CannTrust, Tilray, and KushCo stocks have fallen more than 40% in 2019. Meanwhile, Innovative Industrial Properties and Green Thumb excelled this year. Let’s see why.

Some cannabis stocks fell more than 40% 

So far, 2019 has been disastrous for CannTrust (CTST). The stock has fallen the most among all of the cannabis stocks. Notably, CannTrust has fallen 74% YTD (year-to-date) as of September 23. Tilray (TLRY) has fallen 57% YTD, while KushCo has fallen 42% YTD.

Tilray (TLRY) stock was impacted after it reported wide losses in the second quarter. The company reported a loss of $0.32 per share, which was higher than analysts’ estimates. The company attributed the losses to higher operating expenses related to growth initiatives. As a result, many analysts reduced the target price for the stock due to the company’s asset-light approach.

KushCo (KSHB) reported a negative EBITDA of $7.5 million in the third quarter. The company also reported a net loss of $0.12 per share. Meanwhile, Emerald Health (EMHTF), another medical cannabis company, has fallen 42% YTD.

What happened to CannTrust in 2019?

CannTrust stock took a hit after it violated Health Canada regulations in July. Health Canada accused the company of growing cannabis plants in five unlicensed rooms from October 2018 to March 2019. Health Canada seized all of the dried cannabis harvested in the unlicensed rooms. A special committee conducted the investigations. KPMG withdrew its audit report due to the scandals. Also, CannTrust fired its CEO.

Health Canada even suspended its license under the Cannabis Act. The suspended license brought CannTrust’s revenue growth to a standstill. As a result, the company’s potential is questionable right now. Stay with us to learn more about what went wrong with CannTrust. Now, we’ll discuss the top gainers in 2019.

IIPR and Green Thumb were the winners 

So far, Innovative Industrial Properties (IIPR) has been a winner this year. The company has gained 110% YTD. Innovative Industrial Properties isn’t a conventional cannabis stock. The company is a specialized REIT. Innovative Industrial Properties provides real estate solutions to medical cannabis players. As a result, the company is a popular dividend payer. Innovative Industrial Properties’ connection to the cannabis industry makes it an attractive stock for investors.

The company makes acquisitions to drive growth. Innovative Industrial Properties reported stellar second-quarter results in August, which boosted the stock. Notably, the company earned a 155% increase in rental revenues to approximately $8.3 million, which beat analysts’ revenue estimates. The company’s earnings for the quarter were in line with the estimates but rose 76.4% year-over-year.

Innovative Industrial Properties’ operating performance is usually measured through its FFO (funds from operations) and AFFO (adjusted funds from operations). In the second quarter, the company reported an FFO of approximately $4.7 million and an AFFO of approximately $5.8 million. Notably, the AFFO determines the cash available to be paid out as dividends.

Recently, Jason Williams, a contributing editor for The Wealth Advisory, discussed why he thinks that Innovative Industrial Properties is a good portfolio addition. Usually, cannabis companies require financial support. Under federal law, banks aren’t allowed the help cannabis companies. Innovative Industrial Properties provides financing and helps small cannabis companies expand their businesses. Williams thinks that the stock could hit $200 per share before the end of 2019.

As a result, the banking bill needs to become a law in the US. Read to Cannabis: US House to Vote on Banking Bill to learn more.

Green Thumb saw a 228% YoY increase in its revenues in the second quarter. The stock has gained 25% YTD.

What else is happening in the cannabis industry?

Regulation scandals took a toll on the cannabis sector. However, strong fundamentals and analysts’ positive outlook for the sector drove the performance.

Aurora Cannabis (ACB) reported lower-than-expected fourth-quarter results. The company missed its revenue guidance and analysts’ estimate. However, the company’s segmental revenues rose for the quarter. Aurora Cannabis reported a negative EBITDA of 11.7 million Canadian dollars due to higher operating costs. However, the company expects to deliver a better performance after edibles’ expansion with Cannabis 2.0.

Canopy Growth (CGC) (WEED) reported disappointing results for the first quarter of 2020. The company missed the top-line and bottom-line estimates. Expansion costs in the US and globally impacted Canopy Growth’s performance.

Talking about the cannabis industry, Mike Philbrick, ReSolve Asset Management’s president, said that an industry with massive growth opportunities comes with some challenges and volatility. He thinks that investors who are willing to take the risk can cash in from the growth opportunities if they buy cannabis stocks in small doses.

Overall, most of the cannabis stocks have seen positive growth this year.

• Canopy Growth rose 7%.
• Aurora Cannabis rose 4%.
• Aphria rose 6%.
• Hexo rose 15%.
• OrganiGram rose 16%.
• Cronos Group rose 5%.
• Supreme Cannabis rose 6%.

Overall, September has been good for the cannabis industry. Marijuana legalization made the sector a hot topic again. Many states like Florida and Minnesota are stepping up for legalization. Meanwhile, Canada is preparing for Cannabis 2.0. Mexico might be the next country to legalize cannabis. Read Marijuana Legalization: Mexico Will Seal the Deal! to learn more.

We’ll have to see how cannabis stocks end the year. Stay with us to learn more.

The UK’s National Farming Union (NFU) encourages British farmers to plant hemp for building materials in a new report that sets out a plan to make the agricultural sector carbon neutral by 2040.

The report, “Achieving Net Zero: Farming’s 2040 Goal,” urges farmers to grow hemp for the production of hemp hurd (shivs) for hempcrete construction. Hemp absorbs CO2 as it grows in the field, and continues the absorption process even after its straw is chopped up and installed in walls made of a hemp, lime and water mixture for hempcrete.

Coordination required

“Bio-based materials in construction and industry could deliver GHG savings of 0.5 MtCO2e/year,” NFU notes in the report. “This will also require the implementation of the Government’s Bioeconomy Strategy, as well as support from the Home Office and Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government for novel building and insulation materials.”

The report also recommends using farming bi-products such as methane to produce electricity, and planting more trees and hedgerows to increase carbon storage.

Speeding up progress

UK agricultural emissions have fallen by 16% overall since 1990, but there has been only “modest progress” since 2011, the report says. British farms are responsible for around 10% of UK greenhouse gas emissions, but only 10% of that total is carbon dioxide, while 40% is nitrous oxide from things such as fertilizers, and 50% is methane from cows and sheep.

NFU said improving farm efficiency and land management, changing land use to capture more carbon, and boosting renewable energy are all keys to meeting the 2040 goal.

Land management and the slow pace at which UK hemp farming is developing were cited as sector disadvantages in a recent report from UK’s Centre for Medicinal Cannabis.

Comedy is truth and subversion. As the truth evolves, the jokes change with it. Humor subverts old ideas and clichés. It clears debris and makes room for the new, writes Emerson Dameron.

In the era of cannabis legalization and cultural acceptance, the standard tropes of weed-based humor are ready for the gong and the hook.

A Brief History of Weed Humor

For nearly a century, cannabis has been a source of subversive yuks. During prohibition, simply bringing it up made one a bit of a rebel. The most familiar clichés around weed humor crystalized during the ‘60s and ‘70s as part of the hippie counterculture.

In the '70s, the magazine High Times did more than anything else to define the sensibility, aesthetics, literature, and humor of marijuana. Founded by an outrageous character named Thomas King Forcade, it broke the law, stuck it to the man, and opted out of square culture. It began as a parody of Playboy, with centerfolds featuring splayed-out weed plants. As the years went by and the Reagan Administration militarized the War on Drugs, High Times ventured further into the peripheries of Amercian culture, spreading conspiracy theories and radical libertarianism.

Meanwhile, the comedy stylings of Cheech and Chong, the misanthropic surrealism of cartoonist R. Crumb and director Ralph Bakshi, the experimental funk of George Clinton, and characters such as George Carlin’s “hippy dippy weatherman” brought that offbeat humor into view of the mainstream, even if prohibition meant that it could never fully assimilate. It became a dominant style. The alternative was to get high and watch Reefer Madness, ironically.

The basic tropes of weed comedy has stayed fairly consistent through the decades. The stupidity of prohibition, by itself, provided a lot of comic fodder. Stoners reject authority by indulging in a forbidden hobby, but are almost always limited by overindulgence, rendered too hapless to affect much change in society. Their rebellion is passivity. Weed enhances their ability to make a mockery of the system but limits their potential to fight it.

“I don't think it changed much until a few years ago,” says Scott Dikkers, author of How to Write Funny and founding editor of The Onion. “It had its heyday in the ‘60s and ‘70s for sure, when it was always shock-based, making fun of stoners or stoner culture. Then I feel like it took a break in the ‘80s and ‘90s, with the exception of a couple of stoner movies.”

The successful stoner films and shows of the ‘90s owed a significant debt to Up In Smoke and High Times. If they weren’t set in the ‘70s (Dazed and Confused, That ‘70s Show), they used familiar gags, characters, and plot conventions (Half Baked, How High, Friday, or Dude, Where’s My Car?). 

Stoners are loveable schlubs. They stumble into hijinks and capers mostly through confusion. Their primary superpower is their inappropriately chill and subdued reactions to wild and improbable events, as long as they don’t have to hear "the fuckin’ Eagles." 

The sensitive geeks of the early Kevin Smith oeuvre are distinguished by their witty pop-culture patter, but their love of weed is still tied in with their depiction as shabby, detached outsiders. Weed is a key element of the humor that runs through hip hop, but it’s still used to augment the same defiant worldview. Devin the Dude and Snoop Dogg may not be particularly threatening, but they qualify as lackadaisical outlaws because their defining characteristic is, or at least was, against the law. 

Without prohibition, these jokes lose a lot of their punch.

“I know a lot of comedy writers who use weed to feel more creative, but somehow they aren't using it to make better jokes about weed,” Dikkers says. Now that the societal currents around cannabis are changing, maybe humorists will find fresh ways to crack wise about it. They can start by laying to rest a stock character who's been loitering in comedy for 50-odd years.

Is the Stoner Over?

He's dopey. He's messy. He’s usually a duuude, although female variants exist. He's antisocial in a dumb, non-threatening way. Although he may have moments of sublime, savant-like wisdom, he's generally at the mercy of circumstance. He's a loser, someone to be looked down upon, not one of us.

And that goes for his whole subculture. In comedy, stoners don't accomplish much, and their scenery rarely changes. They're left out of the larger conversation because they lack ambition. They're lazy, solipsistic, and never really pick up the rhythm or connect with those beyond their dens and front porches.

Historically, the stoner scene has been a place for misfits. But now that all sorts of people are using cannabis to relieve stress, treat their medical ailments, explore their psyches, and get more pleasure from their normal, respectable lives, it’s time for the stoner to evolve, to find new and more interesting ways to rebel.

On to the Next Scene

“I'd love to see more observational humor about using weed,” says Dikkers. “There are so many relatable aspects at this point. Just stories and experiences recounted about what being high is like, of what it's like to use marijuana in this day and age when it's not stigmatized anymore. I don't hear that much. Also, stories about new weed users who don't fit the old stereotypes could be funny.”

Some emerging writers and performers are already experimenting with new angles on weed:

• In his groundbreaking series First High, the big-hearted comedian Mike Glazer showcases the endearing and relatable personality traits that weed can coax out of people who’ve never smoked it before.
• The elaborate parlor games of Abdullah Saeed also show how weed can enhance creative exuberance and promote social engagement
• Some of the most fresh and unusual takes on weed comedy come from women: 
  • The work of Rachel Wolfson is grounded in enthusiasm for mental health and entrepreneurship, and her observations on weed culture avoid the shock value associated with prohibition.
  • Adrienne Airhart presents herself as a responsible and sophisticated high-status figure who knows exactly what she’s doing with her drugs (notice how she contrasts herself with a badly drunk interviewer)
  • Abbi and Ilana of Broad City are classic stoners in some ways, but their respective neurotic obsessiveness and Machiavellian hustle are modern adaptations to the economically and socially unforgiving landscape of 21st Century New York

The next wave of stoner comedy will call for a new cast of characters. There will be snobby connoisseurs who exclude others in defense of their own social status. There will be naifs who stumble in and refuse to take responsibility for eating an entire edible. Commercialization will bring with it all the excesses of marketing and capitalism.

Prohibition hasn’t ended overnight — we’re still in the transition period. Some of the old gatekeepers, scaremongers, and bumbling mall cops will hang around for a bit, pulling their old shenanigans, and they will be as ripe for mockery as ever.

“The best satire comes from comforting the afflicted and afflicting the comfortable, so I'd like to see comedy writers making more fun of officials who still think weed is dangerous or a gateway drug,” Dikkers says. “We should be celebrating people who are able to use weed legally in the face of such anti-freedom nonsense. There are plenty of jokes to be made from that subtext.”

Cannabis can help us appreciate paradox, absurdity, and hidden irony. It can open us up to the weird, the wacky, and the counterintuitive. It can help us draw connections that elude the merely caffeinated. A culture in which weed is a part of the mainstream may be a markedly different one from the one we know. It will call for new strains of satire and mockery, especially when there’s more than ever to be wigged out about.

More than 500 people have been diagnosed with vaping-related breathing illnesses, but the cause remains unknown, U.S. health officials said Thursday. An eighth death was also reported.

Meanwhile, the Food and Drug Administration revealed that its criminal investigations unit started tracking leads early on, as cases pointed to black market vaping products. The agency’s tobacco director, Mitch Zeller, stressed that it is not interested in prosecuting individuals who use illegal products but is lending a hand because of the unit’s “special skills.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said 530 confirmed and probable cases have been reported in 38 states and one U.S. territory, up from 380 a week ago.

Missouri joined the list later Thursday, announcing the death this week of a man in his mid-40s at a St. Louis hospital.

Canada reported its first case Wednesday, a high school student who was on life support and has since recovered.

All patients had used an electronic cigarette or other vaping device.

Doctors have said the illnesses resemble an inhalation injury, with the lungs apparently reacting to a caustic substance. So far, no single vaping product or ingredient has been linked to the illnesses, though most patients reported vaping THC, the high-producing ingredient in marijuana.

The man who died in Missouri told his family he started vaping in May for chronic pain, but investigators have not yet determined if he was vaping THC, according to a spokeswoman at Mercy Hospital St. Louis.

Two-thirds of the cases involved 18- to 34-year-olds. Three-quarters are men.

Some of the first cases appeared in April. CDC hasn’t said when most people got sick.

A congressional subcommittee will hold a hearing on the outbreaks on Tuesday.

A group of hundreds of professors, health experts, doctors, and politicians across UK political parties have signed on to letters calling for medical marijuana to be available for free in the United Kingdom. To make medical cannabis available at no cost to patients, prescriptions have to come from the National Health Service (NHS), the UK’s comprehensive, universal, and free-at-the-point-of-service medical system.

Prescribing medical cannabis on the NHS is currently legal in the UK under certain circumstances. But a number of restrictions and bureaucratic obstacles have so far deterred any NHS specialists from prescribing medical cannabis treatments. In their letter, drug and health experts, along with members of Parliament, urge UK Health Secretary Matt Hancock to ease those restrictions. And in another letter, another group of MPs representing Liberal Democrats and Labour have asked Prime Minister Boris Johnson to intervene on behalf of patients unable to obtain medical cannabis prescriptions.

Doctors and MPs Urge UK Prime Minister to Back Free Medical Cannabis Prescriptions

After nearly a year under the UK’s highly restrictive rules for accessing legal medical cannabis, doctors and politicians say its time for a change. They say the current system of controls isn’t working to put medical cannabis in the hands of patients who need it most. And as a result, patients are dying unnecessarily, experts say, from addictions to dangerous painkillers and from symptoms that could be treated effectively and more safely with cannabis.

“The failure of the medical and pharmacy professions to embrace [medical cannabis] being made ‘legal’ is a great worry to patients and carers, and will already have led to more preventable deaths from conditions such as epilepsy,” argue senior doctors and MPs in their letter to Health Secretary Hancock.

According to a recent study from Public Health England, a quarter of all adults in the UK use strong painkillers, sleeping aids, and anti-depressants. Many doctors and researchers, along with patients themselves, have said that cannabis can treat underlying conditions better than those medicines.

Experts in the UK want Hancock to remove restrictions and make it easier for NHS doctors to prescribe medical cannabis. Specifically, they want to do away with rules requiring senior medical doctors to sign off on specialists’ prescriptions. They also want the regulations for importing medical cannabis products simplified. And in perhaps the most important ask, they want general practitioners, not just specialists, to be able to write cannabis prescriptions.

Medical Cannabis is Legal in the UK, But Almost Impossible to Get

The proposed changes to the rules governing medical cannabis could make an immediate change in the lives of many patients. With a prescription from a medical provider on the NHS, patients would be able to obtain cannabis at no charge. Without one, patients who can afford to are turning to private caregivers, where medical cannabis prescriptions can run upwards of $1,250 each month. The high cost ends up driving many patients to unregulated cannabis products for relief.

But health experts, professors and MPs also want to see a longer-term effort to support medical cannabis access. They say educating doctors about medical cannabis and training them how to prescribe it is necessary to overcome physicians’ fears they’ll make a mistake. Health experts wants to see medical cannabis treatments available for patients suffering from a range of conditions, including epilepsy, chronic pain, anxiety, multiple sclerosis, insomnia, depression and others.

But the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), a corporate think tank that advises on national health and social policy, responded to the letters by citing a “lack of clinical evidence to support the use of cannabis products.” NICE does support ongoing efforts to study medical cannabis. In November, Imperial College London Professor David Nutt, a leading drug expert, will launch an independent clinical trial involving 20,000 patients.

CBD’s takeover and introduction into the mainstream has been unprecedented, making many well-known business eager to get involved.

CBD has been called the “next gold rush” so many times, it’s starting to lose it’s impact. Still, the numbers don’t lie, and everything suggests that CBD wellness products are here to stay.

Although reading about CBD’s success is awesome, all of this progress won’t truly hit you until you stumble upon a cannabis-laced product while conducting your regular shopping. And the more cannabis is embraced across America, the more likely this is to happen to people with all sorts of backgrounds. To prove how our times are changing, here are 8 commercial and well respected businesses that are making their moves on the CBD industry (you know CBD is mainstream when Walmart is considering investing in it):

Sephora

CBD and hemp oil are huge within the beauty industry, with dozens of small companies gaining traction and popularity thanks to the growing cannabis industry in America. Sephora, one of the largest distributors of beauty products in the world, has added curated cannabis sections to their stores. These feature notable hemp and CBD products like Lord Jones and Herbivore Botanicals.

Ulta Beauty

Ulta Beauty, known for its wide range of beauty products, announced that in March 2020, they’d carry their first batch of CBD skin-care products. The lotions and creams available will be five different ones from Cannuka, a company known for blending CBD and manuka oil. These products will be available for purchase in Ulta Beauty stores and online.

Neiman Marcus

On January 14, 2019, Neiman Marcus announced that they would offer CBD beauty products in their stores, including brands like Sagely Naturals, Cannuka, Cannabliss Organic, Code of Harmony, and more. “Cannabis beauty brands are becoming increasingly popular and CBD products are the next big thing in beauty. Neiman Marcus plans to continue to expand our CBD assortment while offering customers the latest and greatest in Trending Beauty,” said Kim D’Angelo, beauty buyer for Neiman Marcus. The products offered include face balms, lotions, soaps, serums and masks.

DSW

DSW is also taking the leap into CBD beauty products, which is weird because they sell shoes. DSW is partnering up with Seventh Sense products, selling their body lotions, foot creams and muscle balms. You’ll find these products in 94 out of DSW’s 500 stores all across the US.

Urban Outfitters

Urban Outfitters, known for its clothing and accessories that target men and women between the ages of 18 to 30, recently announced a partnership with CBD for Life. This company has been around since 2015 and specializes in beauty products containing CBD. Urban Outfitters will carry their products in six initial locations, two stores in California and four in New York.

Simon Malls

Simon Malls, the biggest mall owners in America, are opening over 100 CBD stores across their locations in the US. They recently announced their partnership with Green Growth Brands, an Ohio-based cannabis company.

“We are committed to adding new and dynamic retailers and uses to our shopping destinations, and the GGB shopping experience is exactly the type of innovation our customers want and expect from us,” said John Rulli, president of Simon Malls, via press release. The first store is planned to open in March in Castleton Square Mall, Indianapolis. Rulli continued to express his support for CBD, explaining that the stores weren’t pop ups or temporary. “It’s a category that we are embracing and getting behind.”

Whole Foods

Whole Foods founder Steve Mackey recently said that once cannabis is legalized in Texas, grocery stores would probably get involved within the business. “You just never know what happens over time with markets. They change and evolve,” he said. Although selling marijuana in the aisles of Whole Foods sounds like a distant truth, the licensing of CBD and hemp products could occur much sooner, especially considering how other companies and competitors are approaching the matter.

Walmart

Walmart, or the store where you can buy anything and everything, showed some interest last year in CBD. In October 2018, Walmart’s Canada division was conducting research in order to add CBD products to their stores, causing a brief but considerable 2.5 bump on their share price. Currently, you can purchase some of their products online, but we’re still waiting on news that confirm their full investment on the cannabinoid.

The provincial city of Cosenza, at the southern tip of Italy’s boot, is hardly one of the country’s metropolitan centers. But, amidst the town’s narrow streets, several low-THC cannabis shops are open for business.

One of the most prominent is Cicileu, just a block off the Corso Mazzini, Cosenza’s main drag and pedestrian mall. It opened in April 2018, taking its name from the slang word for getting high in a regional dialect (celebrated in songs by local reggae and rap bands) — even though the stuff on sale there doesn’t actually get you high.

But beautiful and fragrant buds are in open display, each in a sealed package marked with the percentage of THC and CBD, all within legal limits that restrict the amount of THC to 0.6%. There is also a perfunctory note on the display cases saying that samples are for “collection” and “ornamental” use. There are also bottles of CBD-infused olive oil, wines and liqueurs, and packages of hemp pasta.

Cicileu co-owner Antonio Agovino says wryly, “We can market it thanks to a legislative hole. There is no law that says you can sell it, but none that says that you can’t.”

But this loophole has led to some turbulent times. In the spring, when Italy’s then-Deputy Prime Minister and de facto leader Matteo Salvini went on an anti-cannabis tirade, Agovino shut the shop to be safe. When Salvini was ousted this September, Agovino reopened the shop. He’s now among the country’s hopeful that a more permissive cannabis climate could be around the corner.

Antonio Agovino in his shop Cicileu.

Italy’s New Leading Coalition

Throughout this summer, Matteo Salvini served as Italy’s far-right de facto leader. When it came to cannabis, Salvini was seen as the figure standing in the way of any progress toward legalization in the country. Now, following a government shake-up in late August, he is gone — and legalization advocates have been swift to react.

Enza Bruno Bossio, a lawmaker with the center-left Democratic Party, one of the two partners of the new coalition government, said last week that the way is now cleared to press the legalization question, according to Italian website Droghe.

Hailing the end of what she called “salviniano obscurantism,” she said there may be sufficient “numbers in parliament” for a cannabis legalization law. “We can now open a discussion in the light of the new red and yellow majority,” she said.

“Red” is a reference to her own party, while “yellow” refers to the fuzzy populists of the Five Star Movement, Salvini’s former coalition partners — who remain the wild card on the issue. Five Star spoke initially spoke in favor of legalization, then flipped when it joined Salvini in power. It remains to be seen if the party will return to its libertarian roots, at least on this issue.

Futile Efforts at Clampdown Under Salvini

Italy’s right-wing governments have sought to tighten up a moderately tolerant cannabis policy since 1993, when Italian voters approved a referendum decriminalizing personal possession of all drugs. But cultivation and sale have remained criminal charges.

Italy’s Constitutional Court in 2014 struck down a 2006 drug law that jacked up sentences for selling, cultivating or trafficking cannabis from 2-4 years to 6-20.

But Salvini revived the clampdown effort upon taking power last June. This May, he blustered: “From today, I’ll go to war on cannabis street by street, shop by shop, neighborhood by neighborhood, city by city.”

This was actually a reference to low-THC varieties, which are sold openly in shops across Italy — and don’t get you high at all. Some smoke them for the CBD, others merely for the cachet of the experience. 

The European Union actually has a 0.2% THC limit for legal hemp, lower than the 0.3% limit in the United States. But for internal use within Italy, Law 242 of 2016 establishes a 0.6% limit — still not enough for an intoxicating effect, but providing more flexibility in the available strains.

Days after Salvini’s May proclamation, Italy’s Supreme Court of Cassation, the highest judicial body in criminal cases, ruled that selling cannabis or its derivatives is illegal despite Law 242.

This was hailed as victory by Salvini. But he either didn’t read the fine print, or was hoping that others wouldn’t. The text of the ruling contained a clear exception for “agricultural” varieties, and “products that in practice have no drugging effect.”

Contrary to the media buzz, the ruling actually didn’t change a thing — and Italy’s low-THC cannabis shops remain open. Some closed doors in response to Salvini’s threats. But with his fall, they are now starting to re-open.

An Italian Grandfather’s Weed

Agovino, the owner of Cicileu, has now re-opened his store, at the same location in Cosenza. He points with pride to a package marked “The Grandfather’s Weed” — in fashionable English. The package also sports a portrait of a rustic-looking old farmer with an impish expression and an outsized mustache. This is actually Agovino’s real grandfather, who grows the 0.2% THC bud on his mountaintop farm.

Agovino says his nonno has been growing cannabis for the past four years on the lands passed down in his family for generations, in the mountains west of Cosenza.

“Before that he was growing tomatoes, fruits, greens,” he says, “but he smoked cannabis in Germany in his 20s, while working in a factory there.”

The store sells 20 varieties, all grown in Italy — five from Calabria, several from Umbria, in central Italy. High-CBD strains are now being cultivated throughout Italy, including in greenhouses in the north, where the growing season is shorter.

The seed must come from within the EU, and only some 50 strains are approved.

“It can’t even come from Switzerland,” Agovino says. “And you can’t cross genetics.”

But he says that low-THC varieties from Hungary produce higher THC levels in the better climate conditions of Calabria.

Even without much THC, in fact, Agovino says, “People buy it to relax, for insomnia, to relieve anxiety. Many adults come here to not have to buy from the underworld.”

Italy has had a medical marijuana program since 2014, but it is very tightly controlled. The cannabis is grown by the military on a base near Florence, and registered users can only purchase one gram a month at a pharmacy. “So people have to go the street and buy illegal, because that’s not enough,” Agovino says.

Calabria’s notorious crime machine, the ‘Ndrangheta, used to grow lots of cannabis, but it largely switched to moving cocaine in the 1980s. Compacted illicit-market pot is now mostly coming in from Albania, across the Adriatic Sea, and Agovino says it often adulterated with methadone.

But legal production of low-THC strains is taking root fast. “There’s been a huge explosion of cultivation in Calabria this year,” Agovino says. 

And he’s proud to be a part of the new economy. A former pipeline worker for Italy’s ENI oil company, Agovino says he is much happier now. “This is my dream since I was a teenager.”