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New Zealand might be world-renowned as a producer of high-quality reggae, but cannabis — the plant so hallowed in the musical genre’s sub-culture — remains tightly controlled in the country.

Cannabis is defined as an illegal substance under New Zealand’s Misuse of Drugs Act and cultivating or supplying the drug can land you as many as 14 years in prison – and even possession could get you three months.

Even in the medicinal market, the usually-progressive Kiwis maintain a reasonably hardline stance. Just one cannabis-based medicine — multiple sclerosis treatment Sativex — has been approved for doctors to prescribe to patients in New Zealand. All other medicinal cannabis products need ministerial approval before they can be prescribed.

But all that may be about to change with a vote slated for November 2020 that could see the floodgates opened to a booming recreational market. In handing down the nation’s budget in May 2019, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced an $13.4 million allocation to hold a referendum on legalisation of cannabis — and one Australian company looks set to capitalise.

The emerging green fields of New Zealand’s cannabis industry

Fresh off the heels of its deal with Canadian company EPHS to cultivate cannabis in Australia, Sydney-based Greenfield MC is turning its attention to New Zealand.

The company has announced a joint venture with New Zealand’s Wepiha Health Co. and EPHS to cultivate the drug, making it the first Australian-owned company to do so across the Tasman, it announced in a statement to the media. The project will initially be for research purposes only, in line with current regulations, with a specific focus on developing cannabis treatments for health conditions that disproportionately impact indigenous Maori communities.

But Greenfield could also see itself moving well beyond the research, and even medicinal, market if the legal environment changed — as it very well could.

“If [the 2020 referendum] is passed into legislation then Greenfield MC will be ideally positioned on the ground in NZ to branch out into new areas beyond medicinal cannabis,” a Greenfield spokesperson said in an email.

The spokesperson clarified to Business Insider Australia the primary focus of any foray beyond medicine would be on the “nutraceuticals and wellness products”, which are considered recreational under New Zealand law.

But when asked directly whether Greenfield would consider supplying product to recreational dispensaries if a ‘yes’ vote was successful, the company’s CEO Nicholas Hanna — a lawyer with a lot of experience navigating Australia’s drug regulations — left the door open.

“Greenfield MC is currently focused on the medical and wellness markets, though will adapt as the industry evolves,” Hanna told Business Insider Australia.

If they were ever to go beyond wellness products and push further into the recreational market, it would be somewhat at odds with comments the company’s chief medical officer Sree Appu has previously made.

Dr Appu, a top oncologist, previously told Business Insider Australia that Greenfield’s competitive advantage is its medical clout and clinical credentials.

“There’s a lot of buzz around the enormous potential of the medicinal cannabis market and people from all walks of life are jumping on board … however, we’re talking about medicine here — we’re talking about a product that needs to be prescribed by doctors and dispensed by pharmacists,” Appu said.

Asked whether the medical board he chairs would support the use of cannabis for recreational purposes, Appu said Greenfield’s doctors wouldn’t be involved in that side of the business were it to eventuate.

“The role of the medical board is limited to advising on the medical applications of cannabis, including patient access and drug efficacy,” he said.

Greenfield’s directors declined to answer whether it would support legalisation of recreational marijuana in Australia.

But of course, any ambitions the company — or anyone else — may have to supply weed to customers for recreational use in New Zealand is at this stage entirely hypothetical. The ‘yes’ vote would first need to win the referendum.

New Zealand’s hazy record of honouring the outcomes of referendums

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is applauded after speaking during the 2019 budget presentation which included $13.4 million for the referendum on the legalisation of cannabis.

And even if Kiwis do vote in favour of legalisation, there is conjecture over whether the vote would even be binding.

Even though both Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Justice Minister Andrew Little have described the vote as a “binding referendum”, public broadcaster Radio New Zealand points out that technically it is not and that the country has a chequered history of implementing the wishes of the people.

Of the seven non-binding referendums held in recent years in New Zealand, just once did the government and parliament act in accordance with the positive vote, RNZ reminds us.

Maybe that’s why — more than 12 months out from the vote — the campaign for hearts and minds on the topic of recreational marijuana is well under way.

Former Labour Prime Minister Helen Clark has been vocal just this week in favour of the proposition. In an article published by The Guardian, Clark makes the case that prohibition “doesn’t work anywhere” and especially not in New Zealand, where she says the Maori population has been particularly victimised by the hardline stance.

“A ‘yes’ vote in the 2020 referendum will be positive for social justice and equity, contribute to reducing the country’s excessively large prison population, and enable those health issues associated with cannabis to be dealt with upfront,” Clark wrote, following a report by her public policy foundation which came to a similar conclusion.

Clark also notes that 76.7% of New Zealanders have tried the drug by the age of 25 despite its illegal status and harsh penalties, indicating the market opportunity may be especially large for recreational marijuana.

No wonder medicinal cannabis companies like Greenfield are considering taking the toke.

Former drug dealers should be recruited and trained to produce safe, legal cannabis if the UK decides to legalise marijuana, the head of an American programme overseeing the sale of the narcotic has urged.

The Commissioner in charge of legal cannabis sales in Massachusetts has said Britain should follow her state’s example of recruiting ex-drug dealers and people from communities involved in what was once the underground market for marijuana.

Ahead of talks with parliamentarians at Westminster this week, Shaleen Title, along with two other US experts on drug liberalisation, revealed that a project is under way in their state – which legalised the drug in 2016 – to retrain former cannabis dealers to enter the now legal marijuana industry.

Title’s call echoes that of Michael Semple, the EU’s one-time special representative to Afghanistan and negotiator with the Afghan Taliban, who said that a future British government would have to open “peace talks” with drug gangs if the UK goes for legalisation.

He told the Guardian he believes that government, police and other authorities must open dialogue with dealers who face going out of business.

Semple said British policymakers would not be able to ignore “the people most directly affected” by making drugs legal.

“Given the sheer number of people involved in drug dealing, and, internationally, the scale of violence associated with the ‘war on drugs’, it should not be difficult for drugs policy makers to envisage a peace process with drugs gangs.”

On the Massachusetts experiment, Title said they had recruited 150 people so far, both ex-dealers and people from areas of Boston and the wider state where drug arrests have been highest.

“They have skills already of course gleaned over a long number of years. It is a way to give people and the voters that backed legalisation in our referendum what they wanted. They did not want to hand the industry over to a few giant corporations that are going to exploit it.

“We are on our first project with 150 people and we put out a bid to vendors who can teach them how to produce cannabis that is regulated. It also includes an ownership programme to train people who were once entrepreneurs in the underground market.”

Title defended the project to absorb ex-dealers and those with drug convictions, saying: “The general model not only in Massachusetts but also in Illinois and California is to reinvest the now legal industry into those communities because it’s a fundamental issue of fairness and justice.

“If for years under drug prohibition you have this security focus on these communities then after legalisation you can hardly say to them, ‘oh never mind now, big corporations will take this business off you, they will take it from here.’ How is that fair?”

Title addressed the Lords this week along with two other American drug liberalisation experts, Sanhoo Tree, from the Washington DC based Institute for Policy Studies, and Kathryn Ledebur, the director of the Andean Information Network in South America. They argued for the need to liberalise the UK’s drugs laws as many US states are doing. New York and New Jersey are expected to be next two states to legalise cannabis use.

Tree pointed out that even the US capital, Washington, has legalised cannabis “where the sky hasn’t fallen in, where people still go to work and where kids still go to school”.

Ledebur, whose area of expertise includes programmes to allow Bolivian farmers to continue cultivating the coca plant from which cocaine is produced, said in “the shift from a US imposed violent eradication of the plant in the so-called war on drugs to a model where coca is rationed, farmers are allowed to grow it for alternatives and it actually works in creating basic farm incomes rather destroying entire crops”.

The trio were guests in London this week of the Transform Drugs Policy Foundation, which campaigns for the legalisation and regulation of drugs in the UK.

As Thailand's cannabis market starts to take off, the biggest opportunities for entrepreneurs may be in technology and services surrounding cannabis, as opposed to cultivating the plant itself.

"We think the market is going to grow very quickly starting now and are looking at an investment timeline of four years," said Douglas Abrams, managing director of the Southeast Asian venture capital firm Expara. "I think Thailand could be the cannabis tech hub, not just of Southeast Asia but of the world."

Expara, headquartered in Singapore and with an office in Bangkok, is raising US$30 million (920 million baht) to invest in cannabis-related startups, mostly in Thailand but also other areas of the world where marijuana is legal. The firm is in talks with one Thai company that builds LED lights for indoor grow houses and another that makes homegrown bioforming devices that control the lights and temperature for cannabis plants.

Mr Abrams said the fund is banking on Thailand and Asia following the same trends as parts of Europe and North America, where changing attitudes about the usefulness of marijuana led to legalisation of medical use and eventually recreational use. Then the growth of the market could be astronomical.

According to the Asia Cannabis Report, Thailand's legal cannabis market for both medical and recreational use could be worth $661 million by 2024, while Asia's market could reach $5.8 billion.

"I think cannabis tech is going to be big in the next 5-10 years, and companies built around it can create huge returns for investors that move early into this space," Mr Abrams said.

He compared cannabis tech to trends like peer-to-peer apps and ride-sharing services that grew from small startups in 2009 to massive international unicorns like Uber and Grab. His own company was able to get into the fintech craze early in 2008, way before the digital payments market exploded in Southeast Asia in 2016.

Expara sees the same potential in cannabis tech and plans to do most of its primary investing over the next four years.

Better Than Growing

Kitty Chopaka, founder of Elevated Estate, a consultancy, event organiser and incubator for cannabis startups, says legal cultivation of marijuana is less profitable than it appears and there are better opportunities in businesses that support growing.

In some legal markets, a mix of over-regulation and taxation has kept margins thin for growers, leading many operations to continue dealing in the black market.

California, for instance, expected $1 billion in tax revenue after legalising recreational marijuana, but only managed to rake in $345 million, mainly due to high taxes that made legal operations unable to compete with the black market.

For savvy investors, the real money is in everything around cultivation, whether it be soil, sensors, lights, packaging or even blockchain tracking technology.

"Instead of fighting for a piece of the pie, I'm just going to have ice cream," Mrs Kitty said. "While it's probably going to be tough for the little guy to get into cultivation, you could make much more money with all the other businesses that touch cannabis. Growing it doesn't make much money, but the guys selling the soil are making a lot."

Moving into a large excise industry like cannabis could be difficult, especially for a small startup, which could rely on obtaining expensive government concessions along with all the palm greasing that entails.

Much like the beer market, where Thais in effect have only three options (Chang, Singha and Leo), marijuana growing could end up wholly controlled by a small, well-connected group of corporations.

So far the government has issued 334 permits to mostly hospital and research facilities to develop medical extracts from cannabis, according to the Food and Drug Administration.

"The money is in innovation, but a lot of what's coming out of Thailand right now is just copy and paste," Mrs Kitty said. "A lot of new ideas could simply be about combining two existing things. Like we have lights and we have sensors, why not combine them into a product that does both."

According to Mrs Kitty, cannabis is a finicky plant and requires careful attention to climate and lighting in order to grow properly, leading to a constant demand for innovation to simplify and reduce costs in the process.

But she says too many fledgling startups are pitching stale ideas, such as seed-to-sale blockchain tracking, a method of tracking cannabis production from when it is sold as a seed to its final endpoint sale to the consumer, cataloguing each transaction on the blockchain.

This technology is useful for regulating cultivation and preventing product from ending up in the black market, but the technology is already widely available and not particularly lucrative territory for new SMEs.

Mrs Kitty says some large Canadian companies have expressed interest in Thailand as a potential market, and even possibly for exports of cannabis, taking advantage of lower Thai wages to produce cheaper per-kilo value than what can be made in Canada.

Canada's Canopy Growth, considered the world's largest cannabis company, already has a presence in Asia-Pacific with an office in Australia (a country with legal medical weed).

"We obviously only operate in countries where it is federally legal, so before we get involved in a new market our investment has to be based on local demand," said Renee Shingles, who manages Asia-Pacific communications for Canopy Growth.

"In Thailand it's still very early," she said, "but we see opportunities, local demand and have partners to work with us. It would definitely be a consideration."

Boom Or Bust?

Daragh Anglim, managing director of Prohibition Partners and author of the Asia Cannabis Report, said the world is already seeing a consolidation in the cannabis industry, whereby large companies, usually from Canada, are starting to move into Europe to buy up cannabis companies or going to Latin America and Africa to acquire low-cost cultivation operations. He says the trend will likely continue in Asia.

"It will be difficult for countries to be able to shift towards low-cost, high-yield production of cannabis," Mr Anglim said. "Instead they should look into more value-added products and extraction branding where different nations can carve out a niche for themselves."

If big players like China and India move in, alongside the large multinationals, it could be difficult for Thailand to compete.

Thailand must develop a niche, perhaps with its own strains native to the country, that can be marketed as a geographically indicated product. Cannabis could also be combined with other popular Thai food and medicinal products.

Even with the Asia Cannabis Report's generous growth forecast for Thailand (with $237 million worth of medical marijuana), Mr Anglim said success still depends on access.

"There is a rush to maybe adopt legalisation, which is great," he said. "But these countries also need to make sure doctors are educated, because in many countries doctors aren't prescribed to relevant conditions or are reluctant to prescribe."

An Ontario cannabis producer is laying off about 180 people following repeated problems with both its product and how it has been produced.

“We have made the extremely difficult decision to restructure our workforce to reflect the current requirements of our business,” said Robert Marcovitch, interim head of CannTrust Holdings.

The layoffs amount to about 20 per cent of the company's workforce.

Last month, CannTrust disclosed the Ontario government's cannabis retailer said it would return almost $3 million worth of cannabis to the company after determining that some of the products didn't live up to the terms of its supply agreement.

The move by the province's crown corporation in charge of wholesale distribution and online pot retail was the latest setback for the cannabis producer, which continues to be under investigation by Health Canada.

In early July, CannTrust disclosed the federal regulator's findings that the company was growing cannabis in unlicensed rooms in its greenhouse in Pelham, Ont.

Health Canada placed a hold on CannTrust's inventory amounting to approximately 5,200 kg of dried cannabis. The company also instituted a voluntary hold of approximately 7,500 kg of dried cannabis equivalent.

CannTrust later voluntarily suspended all sales and distribution of its products as a precaution while regulators investigate its Vaughan, Ont.-based manufacturing facility.

Last month, the company said Health Canada notified CannTrust that its Vaughan facility was rated as non-compliant as well. CannTrust also said in August that the Ontario Securities Commission had opened an investigation into issues around the alleged unlicensed growing at its Pelham greenhouse.

CannTrust has noted that Health Canada has not ordered a recall on any of the company's products.

The company said it is taking steps to solve its regulatory problems.

A board committee is looking into the extent of the non-compliance and guiding efforts to fix it. Both its chief executive officer and board chairman have been replaced.

Shipments of all cannabis products have been stopped and the company said it is developing a plan to comply with Health Canada requirements.

Other provinces have said they'll wait for the results of Health Canada's review before returning any of the company's product.

South Africa’s history of State-sponsored segregation has taught cannabis activists there to avoid the pitfalls of botanical segregation and embrace the eons-old history of use by indigenous people. While countries around the globe struggle to re-regulate, commodify and capitalize on the plant’s resurgent legitimacy, South Africa could be poised to become a beacon of reefer sanity.

The War Against Cannabis in South Africa

In the late 1930s, an international campaign against marijuana was led by Harry Anslinger, the reviled United States Treasury official and head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics. Anslinger is widely credited for instigating cannabis’s worldwide criminalization. It is, however, likely that Anslinger was inspired by the words of J.C. Van Tyen, secretary to South African Prime Minister Jan Smuts, in 1923. In a written statement presented to the League of Nations, Van Tyen implored the international body to include cannabis on its list of “dangerous drugs” as part of the International Opium Convention. “I have the honour to inform you that, from the point of view of the Union of South Africa, the most important of all the habit-forming drugs is Indian Hemp or ‘Dagga’ and this drug is not included in the International List,” he wrote. His recommendations were accepted at the League’s Second Opium Conference of 1924, and became international law in 1925.

Before the League of Nations was formed in 1920, anti-cannabis sentiment had been brewing in South Africa for decades. Section 70 of Law No. 2 in the 1870 criminal code is, according to many scholars and activists, the world’s first explicit law “prohibiting the smoking, use, or possession by, and the sale, barter or gift to, any Coolies whatsoever, of any portion of the hemp plant (Cannabis sativa).” While cannabis use by white and indigenous people was not vilified, use by “coolies,” the then-popular pejorative used to describe slaves from India, was seen by the Natal Indian Immigrants Commission as an impediment to the province’s health, safety and economic growth.

A report by the commission published in 1887 described Indian slaves under the plant’s influence as suicidal, homicidal, listless, incontinent, incoherent and inflicted by other maladies that acutely affected “the constitution of Indians.” Reefer madness was diversified with the passage of the Cape Colony’s Act 34 in 1891, which similarly lambasted the effects of cannabis use by “coloureds.” Falling in line with Harry Anslinger’s international exhortations against marijuana, South Africa escalated its reefer-madness campaign with the passage of the 1937 Weeds Act, compelling property owners to eradicate wild hemp from their land or face financial penalties and imprisonment for second offenses.

Shortly after World War II, South Africa’s National Party took the reins of government and instituted the apartheid system, entrenching division in an already segregated society ruled by white descendants of Dutch and British colonialists. Even though they made up nearly 80 percent of the population, non-white people were forcibly and systematically segregated from white areas, denied access to myriad employment opportunities and denied the rights to vote, own land or marry white people. That system remained in place until 1994, when the militant saboteur turned political activist Nelson Mandela was released from prison after serving 27 years and became president. Mandela not only ushered in an end to apartheid, but hastened the passage of a new Constitution in 1996 that is viewed by many as the world’s most progressive, open and protective of civil liberties and human rights.

Before that could happen, however, the apartheid regime passed laws that vilified cannabis users including the Medicines Act in 1965 and the Rehabilitation Act in 1971. In that year alone, 70,000 black men were arrested on “dagga” charges. The 1992 Drugs and Drug Trafficking Act (Drugs Act) served as the apartheid regime’s final strike against cannabis users, codifying asset and property forfeiture, incarceration and other penalties. After its passage, anyone in possession of more than 115 grams of cannabis would be considered a dealer and was subject to harsher sentencing guidelines.

An Alliance That Changed Everything

While most nations and states reform cannabis laws through political channels, South Africa’s decriminalization process was mandated through the judicial system. On September 18, 2018, South Africa’s Constitutional Court, the highest in the Republic, decriminalized cannabis use and possession in private spaces. The Constitutional Court imposed a two-year deadline for Parliament to enact new laws. What comes from this is anyone’s guess, but if the activists who started the change have their say, South Africa is poised to create the world’s most progressive cannabis regulatory system.

Traditional healers fight for cannabis/ Dagga Couple

The Law Student

After successfully completing his legal studies in 1997, Gareth Prince, a Rastafarian, was denied a law license. Years before, he had twice been arrested for cannabis possession. While these convictions did not necessarily bar him from becoming a lawyer, he told the South African Law Society he was going to continue using cannabis because his religion required him to do so. Subsequently, the Law Society took the view that anyone who declared an intention to continue breaking South African laws was not “a fit and proper person” capable of joining its ranks because it “may bring the profession into disrepute.”

In order to get his law license, Prince first sued the Law Society and later added the minister of justice, the minister of health and the attorney general of the Cape of Good Hope as respondents. Prince first tried to represent himself, arguing that the Drugs Act discriminated against Rastafarians’ religious rights, but committed procedural errors that eroded the credibility of his case. In a last-ditch effort, he hired a professional legal team, who added aspects of the Medicines Act to his appeal on the grounds that the Drugs Act violated South Africa’s new Constitution, but the damage had been done.

The court considered but didn’t buy Prince’s use of Rastafarianism as cause for an exemption from the Drugs or Medicines Acts. The majority judges asserted that “neophytes” would join the religion as a way to use cannabis legally. Additionally, the logistics of policing an exemption for Rastafarians were simply too complicated for the court to bear. “Consider the dilemma of a policeman who finds cannabis in the possession of a person who claims to be a Rastafarian. How can he be sure that the claim is valid?” Interestingly, Prince cited how Nelson Mandela had been allowed to practice law despite his conviction for conspiring to overthrow the state. The judges rejected this argument because Mandela had no intention of continuing his work as a militant saboteur. In May 2000, Prince lost his appeal in a 6-5 ruling and was ordered to pay court costs incurred by the Law Society. In its denial, the Law Society told Prince that he would not only have to wait for Parliament to decriminalize cannabis, but would need to appeal to South Africa’s Constitutional Court.

With religious grounds off the table, a new challenge was needed. Instead of discrimination, privacy became the lynchpin that has partially decriminalized cannabis in South Africa.

Protestors encounter police/ Dagga Couple

The TV Producers

Myrtle Clarke and Julian Stobbs were successful filmmakers who made documentaries, commercials, music videos and movies for most of their adult lives. Both were, and still are, avid cannabis users. They were comfortable, white, upper middle class, and owned a lovely home in Johannesburg. All of that was put in jeopardy when police came banging on their door at 2 a.m. one night in 2010. In his underwear and groggy from sleep, Stobbs opened the door, allowed them inside and admitted there was cannabis on the premises. The couple were separated, strip-searched and interrogated until dawn. Over and over, the police demanded to know, “Where’s the drug lab?” For two hours, police jammed a gun in Stobbs’s cheek, all the while ransacking the place looking for a “drug lab” that wasn’t there.

Clarke and Stobbs were eventually hauled off to a local police station and kept in fetid, separate cells until their release later that day on a 1,000-rand ($73) bail. That amount might seem nominal for Americans, but for the thousands of mostly black South Africans arrested annually for cannabis offenses, a 1,000-rand bail means extensive jail time before seeing a judge.

Clarke and Stobbs were charged with cannabis possession and, because police found more than 115 grams, dealing charges were added. They faced some choices: plead guilty and tar themselves with criminal records, pay an 80,000-rand ($6,000) bribe or sue the government for enacting unjust laws. A guilty plea would haunt them for the rest of their lives, potentially crippling their professional careers and travel opportunities. Facing seven to 10 years in jail, they nearly paid the bribe, which would have made their arrest records disappear. They quickly realized, though, that a bribe was a temporary solution. What would stop the police from coming back for more? There was no way the couple was going to stop using cannabis, so the risk of further extortion would linger forever. As time wore on, they suspected the cops targeted them because the police believed they had the means to afford a bribe and wouldn’t want to risk jail and a criminal record.

After much hand-wringing, stressful debate and joint-smoking, they found a lawyer and filed suit against seven government departments on the grounds that their arrest had violated their constitutional right to privacy. Clever legal-wrangling and more lawyers delayed a proper trial for another seven years. And so began the “Trial of the Plant” in August 2017. Forming a united front, Clarke and Stobbs combined their case with Prince’s and another medical-cannabis user who had originally chosen to represent himself. Their suit alleged that the government’s cannabis laws should be deemed unlawful. On September 18, 2018, the Constitutional Court ruled in their favor, decriminalizing cannabis use and cultivation in private spaces.

The concept of privacy in terms of cannabis is still vague, but Clarke and Stobbs’s attorney, Paul-Michael Angelo Keichel, believes cars, backpacks and pants pockets are all private spaces and can’t be searched without cause or a warrant. Police are still coming around to these concepts, but arrest rates for cannabis possession have dropped precipitously since the ruling.

Crowdsourcing the Cannabis Lawmaking Process

After their story broke over South African media in 2010, the newly christened “Dagga Couple” formed Fields of Green for All (FGA), a nonprofit that collects and disseminates information about global cannabis regulations and adapts them for use in South Africa. FGA and its “Green Network” provide access to legal resources for people facing legal trouble, and they are currently drafting laws they will present to Parliament before new regulations are enacted sometime before September 2021. So far, FGA has succeeded in achieving 36 High Court orders staying the prosecution of people accused of violating the Drugs Act. The group estimates that there are currently 900,000 cannabis farmers in South Africa that support approximately three million people.

The first-draft guide to the proposed legislation—based on the slogan “Nihil de nobis, sine nobis,” Latin for “Nothing about us, without us”—is currently posted online and is designed to support everyone who currently uses, makes a living from or is affected by cannabis laws. Their “Proposal for the Legal Regulation of Cannabis in South Africa” is the result of eight years of painstaking research into cannabis regulatory regimes around the globe, cherry-picking and adapting rules and systems that support traditional healers and black-market dealers.

The 40-page, publicly available, crowd-sourced document is a must-read for any cannabis regulator or activist. It covers everything any government bureaucrat might worry about: worker safety, environmental impacts, testing, taxes, training for workers and cultural issues. Instead of demonizing those who do business in unregulated cannabis markets, FGA is careful to protect them. “South Africa has an existing Cannabis economy,” reads the proposal, “one that is centuries old and, although it is called ‘the black market,’ it functions very efficiently and contributes vast sums to the economy in an informal way.”

FGA Has Established Several “Non-Negotiable” Outcomes

• An age limit of 18 years old unless a minor requires cannabis for a medical condition.
• Cannabis regulations will not be structured around a license system where any individual, organization or government body has the right to grant or deny said license.
• Cannabis must not be regulated in any manner that is harsher than alcohol or tobacco.
• The cessation of any arrest or incarceration for cannabis use, cultivation and trade. Non-criminal sanctions for violations must be clearly set out before any regulations are put into place.
• Nobody will be excluded from the new cannabis economy because of a criminal record for a cannabis-related offense.
• There will be no testing for cannabis at work unless there are sufficient grounds that the employee is not fulfilling his or her duties in terms of an employment contract and there are also sufficient grounds to suspect that the employee’s use of cannabis is the cause of this failure to perform those duties.
• The use of cannabis cannot be used in family disputes or custody battles no more than the use of alcohol can be used under these circumstances.
• The legitimization of the current SA cannabis industry must be a priority before any new regulations are put in place. The black market must become part of the formal market economy with immediate effect.
• All criminal records for the use, possession and trade of cannabis must be expunged from the record immediately. All prisoners being held on cannabis charges must be released immediately with no conditions.

While not on the “non-negotiable” list, FGA demands that “All large scale indoor growing MUST use renewable energy sources—solar or wind power.” Furthermore, “tax revenue from Cannabis must be used for education, harm reduction and tangible social upliftment. The ONLY criteria required will be a registered business and tax number.

This process will be made accessible and simple for ALL South Africans and will have the added benefit of introducing thousands of previously disadvantaged citizens to the formal economy.”

FGA demands that cannabis be controlled by a “Cannabis OmuBUDsman” elected by those who register for production permits and licenses and not appointed by corruptible government officials.

Until Parliament enacts more specific regulations about distribution, the concept of personal use will remain vague. For those caught with large amounts, packaging is key. While it might be possible to convince a police officer that a backpack containing a five-pound brick of pot is someone’s winter stash, the same five pounds divided into street-ready two-gram baggies will probably result in a dealing charge.

Clarke and Stobbs’s court victory has sparked a surge in the sale of equipment for indoor growing. Hydroponic systems, lights and plant nutrients are flying off store shelves, but how private growers attain seeds and clones has not been addressed.

Clarke explained the dilemma to High Times in December 2018. “We still have those dealing charges because we only got decriminalization and trade is not allowed yet,” she said. “They have two years to change the laws. We are going to postpone our case and book a date for six months after the deadline. We intend to write the legislation and present the government with it. If they don’t give us what we want, we will strike back in court.”

Over the past few months, social media and search engine behemoths Facebook and Google have gone to great lengths to ban and censor CBD and hemp-related advertisements on their platforms — despite that the 2018 Farm Bill legalized the cultivation of hemp-derived CBD, writes Sara Brittany Somerset.

Facebook recently confirmed the ban, disabled advertising and “boost-post” privileges for mainstream brands like Dr. Bronner’s hemp-based soap company, and yet, has still not announced clear rules or reasoning for this decision. 

According to a spokesperson for Dr. Bronner’s, Facebook disabled their advertising account (which is different from their actual Facebook page, which remains in tact) in early June for promoting hemp too often. The company does not know when it will be enabled again.  So even though hemp farming is now fully legal in the United States, hemp is still treated as an illegal drug under Facebook’s ad policy.

“Hemp does fall under our policy for related drug items.” 

Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soap company is a mainstay not only in every hippie household, but also in mainstream supermarkets and bodegas across the country. Dr. Bronner's reached out to Facebook “numerous times to explain the difference between hemp and marijuana (although Dr. Bronner’s supports the legalization of both), and provided examples of hemp-related posts on Dr. Bronner’s Facebook page that had been approved in the past—leading to confusion about inconsistent policy enforcement.” 

On May 31, Facebook approved a Dr. Bronner's post about a Hemp History Week Event. On June 3, they then approved a promoted Dr. Bronner's post about Illinois legalizing adult use marijuana. And yet, exactly one week later on June 10, Facebook vetoed a post about the company's latest blog (title "Return of the Plant: the Promise of Hemp") and disabled their ad account.  

In 2017, however, Facebook informed Dr. Bronner’s that "advocacy or awareness ads are allowed," which the soap company believes aligns with its content. 

“Our posts about hemp and marijuana focus on changing legislation, celebrating legislative wins, pointing out systemic racism, et cetera. We never promote the sale of hemp or marijuana, or even make jokes about people smoking,” said Dr. Bronner’s social media manager, Stacey Oparnica.

Yet, Facebook told Oparnica that the post they rejected wouldn't be running because it didn't follow their Advertising Policies: "We don't allow ads that promote prescription or recreational drugs. Ads like these are sensitive in nature and are usually contrary to local laws, rules or regulations. Please keep in mind that advocacy or awareness ads are allowed. If you've read our policies and think that we made a mistake, you can request a second review by our team."

According to Oparnica, all the company’s appeals to Facebook were denied. “I had a third look at your ad account and we won’t be able to re-enable it," Facebook officials wrote to Dr. Bronners. "At this point, there’s no further action that you may take. We don’t support ad accounts that do not comply with our Advertising Policies or other standards. Please consider this decision final.” 

As such, Dr. Bronner’s is calling on Facebook to amend its advertising policy, and to “stop vilifying this climate-friendly, non-psychoactive plant.” The soap company took to Twitter to express their dismay: "Facebook disabled our advertising account for promoting #hemp,” Dr. Bronner’s tweeted. "Despite the fact that hemp farming is now fully legal in the United States, hemp is still considered illegal under Facebook's ad policy."

According to a Facebook spokesperson, the company’s “policy remains the same: We don’t allow people to promote CBD or ingestible hemp on Facebook. The update to non-ingestible hemp was made months ago.” That includes hemp milk, cereal, or other edible items. 

However, Facebook banned advertising for CBD or ingestible hemp, even though those products were not explicitly mentioned in the company’s advertising policies. Essentially, Facebook cryptically walked back its ban on hemp-derived CBD, but in reality, only for topicals.

Similar to Facebook, Google has taken a comparable approach, while simultaneously and covertly beta-testing a trial CBD ad program. Participating brands including Chilyo, which sells cannabidiol items, may pay to advertise — so long as the advertisement does not mention “CBD.” Yes, it's as confusing as it sounds: You can advertise for CBD without using the word "CBD."

The censorship of CBD and even hemp is not limited to social media, nor to CBD advertising. In March, 2019, a senior account manager at Anderson and Vines, who sells ads for TIME and the Wall Street Journal made overtures towards the female-led networking company Women Grow, via email. However, when Women Grow’s president Gia Morôn agreed to advertise, her ad was rejected. 

“Our campaigns are run through Google, and they won't allow certain content, and anything cannabis related just can't run,” the account rep told Ms. Morôn.

This week, Korto Momolu for Women Grow will be participating in the upcoming, New York Fashion Week (NYFW) show, on September 7 — and yet, while hemp will be part of the catwalk, Women Grow is not allowed to promote their NYFW event on the social media platform, like the other designers do.

“Facebook keeps shutting our advertising down; all Women Grow advertising. We can’t boost our posts, even though Facebook knows we are a women-led, minority-owned, ancillary business,” said Morôn. “I have gone back and forth with Facebook’s ad people. I explained we are helping women do business. We are not doing anything illegal.  We are doing targeted advertising, hitting the 33 legal states, and Facebook still won’t let us promote. We are responsible women: working mothers and entrepreneurs, and they are blocking our opportunities for growth.”

On August 15, an exasperated, Ms. Morôn asked Facebook for a meeting through its message portal; however, so far, they have not granted her the opportunity to present Women Grow for reconsideration. 

Attorney David Holland, executive director of the Empire State chapter of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML), takes umbrage with Facebook’s Orwellian policies including censorship of Women Grow and other companies.  

“The Facebook dilemma is extremely troubling on several levels: Not only is the exchange of legal goods and services being arbitrarily stifled, but the exchange of ideas in today’s virtual public square is being censored by machines where algorithms, not people, are determining what is appropriate speech,” Holland said. 

On Thursday May 18, 2019, Holland filed a suit, pro bono, against Facebook, on behalf of Cannaramic Media, LLC., — a media company that was formed to enhance the national debate in education about cannabis-related issues. Cannaramic’s first significant project was to assemble educational lectures by 25 leading authorities in the field and to air that for free over the internet as a first of- its- kind, online summit. 

Interestingly, Holland completed the lawsuit’s paperwork the same day as the White House announced it is monitoring censorship by Facebook, and asking people to submit their complaints directly to the administration using this form.

Currently, the case is temporarily withdrawn and dismissed without prejudice “due to an overwhelming response by similarly situated individuals, activists and businesses expressing their desires to join Cannaramic as a plaintiff, in order to further the national dialog with Facebook and Congress on cannabis-related issues,” according to a notice of voluntary withdrawal, filed in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. 

Holland intends to re-file the lawsuit as soon as he re-drafts the complaint to include additional plaintiffs. "A systematic campaign of thought control is being commenced by the very platform that was designed to bring people together to discuss these very ideas – all of which are perfectly legal," he said. "Thought crimes should remain the fodder of novels, not novel and omnipresent social media platforms.”

Civilized reached out to a representative for Facebook, repeatedly for comment but did not receive a reply.

Scientific evidence is beginning to mount that cannabis may prove beneficial in the fight against cancer. The latest comes from a Harvard University study involving cannabis flavonoids and pancreatic cancer.

The news comes on the heels of other research the past several years that involves marijuana and cancer treatment. For example, a Washington study found that 25 percent of cancer patients surveyed used marijuana to manage pain from cancer treatments. Studies in Minnesota and Israel found that marijuana use lowered usage of pain-killing opioids, including those used by cancer patients.

The study from Harvard’s Dana-Farber Cancer Institute is different because it discovered cannabis might go beyond treatment for cancer-related pain and nausea. The study found that flavonoids in cannabis show potential in slowing pancreatic cancer tumor growth and stopping the spread of pancreatic cancer.

What are flavonoids, anyway?

Found throughout the plant kingdom, flavonoids are a natural chemical that gives plants their color. They contain vitamins and minerals and antioxidant properties. Each color offers something slightly different, which is why nutritionists recommend eating a diet with many differently colored fruits and vegetables.

In marijuana, these flavonoids are sometimes called cannflavin. In 1985, a London researcher found that cannflavin has the potential to fight inflammation and pain. Canadian researchers recently announced they have unlocked the key to using cannflavin for producing a natural painkiller 30 times more effective than aspirin.

But the Harvard study takes cannabis flavonoids into a whole new area.

Harvard study takes on pancreatic cancer.

Researchers at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute announced in a study published in Frontiers in Oncology that cannabis flavonoids may have “significant therapy potential” in treating pancreatic cancer. 

The group decided to focus on pancreatic cancer because it is so difficult to treat. They wrote that pancreatic cancer comes with a “five-year survival rate for patients at a dismal 8 percent.” One of the key factors in this is that pancreatic cancer creates an immunosuppressive tumor that develops a resistance to treatment.

Using cannabis flavonoids, the researchers created a drug called FBL-03G. This drug, when injected into mice and combined with radiotherapy, slowed cell growth of certain types of cancer. The drug also led to “significant increase in survival for animals with pancreatic cancer compared to control cohorts.”

Wilfred Ngwa, Global Health Director at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Brigham and Women’s Cancer Center at Harvard Medical School, told survivor.net that the findings were “very surprising.” The researchers hope to eventually get the drug approved for a clinical trial.

The findings by the Harvard researchers add to a growing list of studies showing there is potential for marijuana in battling at least the spread of cancer. A recent study out of India reviewed the literature from studies around the world. Among their findings were studies that showed evidence cannabis can slow cancer tumor growth and that one CBD compound showed potential in stopping the spread of certain types of breast cancer.

Portugal’s California-like weather has seen a third Canadian company look to establish a cannabis cultivation footprint in the country.

First it was Tilray, then it was Aurora and now The Flowr Corporation is set to grow cannabis in the country. Flowr has announced plans to acquire the remaining 80% stake in Portuguese firm Holigen which has established a huge cannabis operation in Aljustrel, about 100 miles south east of the capital Lisbon.

The 72-hectare site could become one of the largest cannabis facilities in the world. Located in the Alentejo region it will initially produce about 500,000 kilograms of cannabis per year – and could rise to more than 630,000 kilograms.

Cannabis Clones For Export

Flowr also announced that it has received a Health Canada export permit that will allow it to make an initial shipment of clones from its Kelowna Campus to Portugal.  It says the permits will allow the Aljustrel operation to garner its first outdoor harvest later this year. Its CEO Vinay Tolia said the deal is a major milestone and a ‘cornerstone in its efforts to service the global medical cannabis market’.  

“Aljustrel is one of the largest outdoor THC cultivation licenses in the developed world, and will be instrumental in providing large-scale, low-cost cannabis extract for pharmaceutical APIs, as well as oils to service the European medical markets.” 

Ideal Climatic Cannabis Conditions

Flowr, which is based in Toronto, builds and operates large-scale, GMP-designed cultivation facilities and recently announced plans to raise up to C$125 million to finalize the Holigen purchase. One of Portugal’s major attractions for such foreign companies is that it has ideal climatic and cultivation conditions.

It represents an attractive market, with relatively low labor costs and and a recent change in the law allows for the distribution of medical cannabis to other EU nations, where it is legal. Edmonton-based Aurora has signed an agreement to acquire a 51% ownership stake in Gaia Pharma, a Portuguese-based company with plans to produce medical cannabis and derivative products.

Aurora said construction of the first phase of the Gaia facility, capable of producing up to 2,000 kilograms of cannabis a year, was expected to be completed in late 2020.