Health regulators are on the defensive about their latest attempt to get the state's medical-marijuana industry up and running, rejecting criticism from a legislative oversight panel while trying to assuage concerns of parents of sick children.

At a hearing Monday, the Florida Department of Health's Office of Compassionate Use Director Patricia Nelson fielded questions from investors and nursery owners eager to become one of five operators authorized to grow, process and dispense non-euphoric cannabis believed to eliminate or dramatically reduce life-threatening seizures in children with rare forms of epilepsy.

The emerging legal marijuana economy will see explosive growth in the coming years. Insurers should be prepared to adopt policies that spell out coverage for legally grown marijuana plants and medical marijuana property. The cannabis industry is expected to grow to nearly $15 billion over the next four years. In states where manufacture, sale and use is legal for recreational purposes, legalization will have a profound impact on not only personal lines insurance, but also commercial coverage, workers’ comp, product liability, healthcare insurance and more.

Investor Insight: John M. Torrens, Syracuse, NY

Are you searching for capital that you don’t really need? Do you believe that your business venture will succeed simply because it involves cannabis? Are you solving an actual problem? These are all questions that every entrepreneur in our industry should be asking themselves and the fantastic John M. Torrens of KC Ventures, is the gentleman who’s availed himself to get this important conversation started with all of us.

How did your entrepreneurial journey begin?

March 2, 2015

Missouri has joined the growing number of states legalizing CBD-based medicines.

The state awarded cultivation and production licenses for hemp to two companies, Noah’s Arc Foundation and BeLEAF Corporation. Mitch Meyers, the head of BeLEAF, also has plans to open a medical marijuana dispensary near Chicago, according to a Missouri TV station.

Fox News Medical A-Team member Dr. David Samadi asserted over the weekend that “crack babies” were caused by women “smoking this whole marijuana business.”

On the Saturday edition of Fox & Friends, host Clayton Morris reported that a recent study published in Scientific Reports found that marijuana was less dangerous than any other common recreational drug, including alcohol and cigarettes.

PORTSMOUTH, R.I. — A tiny spider mite is all it could take to cripple Seth Bock’s business.

Bock grows marijuana, legally, for a living, and the peril presented by just one small insect illustrates how difficult it can be to establish a thriving dispensary.

His is one of three medical marijuana dispensaries in Rhode Island, and his experience provides vital lessons for companies in Massachusetts that have won licenses to grow and sell marijuana. The first is expected to open in April.

For marijuana dispensaries, it’s never as easy as sticking a few seeds in the ground and watching the plants, and the profits, grow. “There are so many moving parts to this business,” Bock said.

by Kiley Kroh Posted on March 1, 2015 at 1:32 pm Updated: March 1, 2015 at 2:38 pm

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"D.C. Residents Won’t Let Congress Blunt Their Enthusiasm For Legal Pot Business"

A couple of recent events have us thinking about the different ways retailers and cultivators are doing business in the cannabis market. First, a few of our clients have asked us about situations involving groups of retailers banding together to negotiate with producers and vice versa ­— groups of producers teaming up to negotiate prices and supply contracts with retailers. Then, Washington’s Liquor Control Board released emergency rules that, among other things, severely limited the ability of Washington marijuana businesses to enter into standard sales agreements. How are these things connected?

Some may not like it, but legal cannabis is big businessalready — a $700 million business last year in Colorado alone, Viridian Capital & Research reports. With two more states legalizing in 2014, and an estimated seven to 13 additional states that will contemplate legalization this year, this is a market niche that’s set to take off.

Sure, there are risks galore. Viridian cites inexperienced management, lack of a federal banking green light, risk of legal prosecution, pricing pressure, and too much debt as problems that will likely cause an industry shakeout this year.

VANCOUVER -- The free-for-all era of Canada's commercial medical marijuana industry is over as a new crop of growers try to woo scarce investment dollars in an increasingly competitive business, observers say.

Boris Ziger, CEO of Matica Enterprises Inc., said the short-lived days of unbridled growth ended soon after last year's change in federal regulations that shifted medical-marijuana production to commercial enterprises from patients growing their own pot.

He said the stock market went "absolutely crazy" in the spring of 2014 as various companies began branding themselves as pot producers in hopes of cashing in on what was really "irrational exuberance you hear about in business school."