A comedy about Canada’s upcoming cannabis legalization is headed for the big screen.

Canadian company We’ll Be Over Here Productions Inc., says production has begun in Toronto on the feature film “Canadian Strain.”

Written and directed by Geordie Sabbagh, the film stars Jessica Salgueiro as a boutique weed dealer who has been put out of business by the legalization of cannabis.

Salgueiro hails from Winnipeg and is being featured at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival as a Rising Star.

Colin Mochrie plays her dad and Naomi Snieckus plays her uptight retail co-worker.

The cast also includes Natalie Brown, Benjamin Ayres, Dion Johnstone, Hannah Spear, and Nelu Handa.

What do alcohol, tobacco and gambling have in common?

On the one hand, they have been viewed as “sinful” activities, perhaps bringing immediate pleasure to the partaker but health and social costs in the long run. Governments look to prohibit or limit such scurrilous consumption.

On the other hand, these sinful activities are also common favourites for taxation. In Gulliver’s Travels, a Lagado island professor argues for “effectual ways and means of raising money without grieving the subject,” which, of course, would be to justly tax “vices and folly.”

With marijuana set to be legalized in Canada on October 17, the provincial government recently announced a policy change that would allow recreational pot to be sold in retail stores while the province handles online sales.

Under the province’s new retail model, Ontario residents 19 years of age and older will be able to buy legal cannabis through a government-run website before the ‘private retail model’ is launched in 2019.

Buried dozens of pages deep in the Progressive Conservative government's Budget Implementation and Tax Statutes Amendment Act is a provincial sales tax exemption for recreational cannabis.

There will still be a series of fees and markups associated with the sale of legal marijuana, but an eight per cent sales tax isn't one of them.

Manitoba Liquor and Lotteries will charge retailers 75 cents per gram plus nine per cent to the retailers for managing the distribution of marijuana from growers to sellers.

Retailers will also pay six per cent of their revenues as a social responsibility fee to the government .

Shatter, budder and other cannabis concentrates that can be consumed using small, portable vaporizers have become very popular in legal states. In Canada, however, vapes won't be part of the legal framework come October 17 because the Canadian government is concerned about their impact on public health and safety.

As Canadian institutions grapple with the details of cannabis legalization, Abe Verghis is helping to fill in some of those gaps.

The Halton Hills resident and mechanical engineer works with a company that is developing oral drug test kits for cannabis, cocaine and methamphetamine, which will revolutionize roadside drug testing for police officers once pot is legal.

Aside from his day job, Verghis is running for a seat in council, where he hopes to offer some of his expertise in road safety, business and community matters.

“I’ve always had a fascination for the work of a council,” said Verghis. “I like to be involved. I think I can bring a lot of experience to the council.”

Ontario is ditching plans for government-run cannabis outlets in favour of letting private businesses run the shops.

The last-minute switch means people in Ontario won’t be able to shop in any stores at all when recreational marijuana becomes legal across the country on Oct. 17.

The government aims to have private stores running by April 1, 2019, which leaves time for wide consultations about the new system, Finance Minister Vic Fedeli said Monday.

However, cannabis will be sold online for home delivery on Day 1, Fedeli promised.

The Ontario Cannabis Retail Corp., the subsidiary of the LCBO set up by the previous Liberal government, will still act as a wholesaler and be responsible for online sales.

Cannabis is slowly taking root in increasingly tolerant communities. The incremental decriminalization or legalization of cannabis across the world has fed an expanding international market trading the plant, its extracts and its end products.

"2018 has seen a lot of trends in cannabis, but the beginning of an international market infrastructure is one of the most promising features of the industry for investor interest,” AxisWire CEO Cynthia Salarizadeh told Benzinga.

Canadian pets are a few steps closer to getting their paws on pot-based medical treatments in Canada as more cannabis companies research marijuana's efficacy for companion animals.

Canopy Growth Corp. is the latest medical marijuana company to enter the potentially lucrative pet market with its announcement this week that it will embark on a Health Canada-approved clinical trial to research the use of cannabis-based products to treat animal anxiety.

The Canadian Veterinary Medical Association's Dr. Shane Renwick says there's been a flurry of cannabis-related pet health research as Canada's laws on recreational cannabis crystallize ahead of legalization on Oct. 17.

A company in Canada has been given the green light to trial cannabis in pet food to help calm anxious animals.

Health Canada’s Veterinary Drug Directorate has given approval to Canopy Animal Health to carry out clinical trials of the cannabis-derived compound cannabidiol (CBD) as a treatment for pet ailments.

CBD is the main ingredient in hemp oils and is associated with pain relief, as opposed to THC, the ingredient in marijuana can produce a high.