HEMPORIUM

With close to 40 countries growing low-THC industrial hemp, South Africa is falling behind, says Tony Budden.

Cape Town -

Cannabis… it certainly seems to be popping up in all sorts of strange places lately.

The mainstream media seem finally to be giving the plant some positive space, not just focusing on the “dangers” and reporting on the different initiatives around the world to get it liberated, a far cry from the old days of the “groen-gevaar”, the devil’s weed.

LOS ANGELES — Chris Folkerts started selling electronic cigarette-like devices from the trunk of his car two years ago. Now he and two partners own one of the biggest brands in the business, with products in 4,000 stores nationally, an art deco office on the city's fashionable Miracle Mile and an endorsement deal with rapper Snoop Dogg.

The rapid success of Grenco Science, the privately held company Folkerts founded, mirrors the fast growth of the business it is in — marketing devices that allow marijuana users to vaporize their psychoactive weed rather than smoke it.

"This is a big industry — it is the future,'' Folkerts, 31, says. "We're really on the cusp of exploding.''

 Daviot Kelly, Staff Reporter

Head of the Morris Entrepreneurship Centre (MEC), Hazel Wright-O'Connor, believes young persons can create business ventures using medical marijuana, provided the plant is legalised.

The MEC is an outreach unit of the Northern Caribbean University (NCU). The centre's primary focus is to provide business-development services for micro, small and medium-size enterprises.

Wright-O'Connor said students from the university's chemistry, biology and biochemistry departments were doing "wonderful things", including the creation of preservatives using gel, which eliminates the need for refrigeration.

Ian Boyne

We are so intoxicated about the prospects of escaping our perennial poverty through the booming US$140-billion global ganja business that we couldn't care less about any scientific evidence which might exist about its potential harm. Ganja market and investment enthusiasts - not to mention Rastafarians like Michael Lorne - are so high over decriminalisation that they are impatient of discussion of any negative effect of ganja smoking.

Below is an urgent plea from member of Parliament Dr. Mario Oriani-Ambrosini, author of the Medical Innovation Bill, a bill which aims to legalize Cannabis in South Africa for medical and industrial purposes:

Derrick Aarons GUEST COLUMNIST

The strong push to decriminalise ganja in Jamaica for medicinal use or scientific purposes has accelerated recently and is said to be on the parliamentary agenda for the upcoming legislative year. Many have trumpeted potential benefits of this matter as including gains in human rights, tourism, medicinal research, taxation, agricultural and broad economic benefits.

Specifically, there has been much discussion regarding a possible medicinal marijuana industry that could bring potentially great economic benefits to Jamaica. However, not much, if any discussion, has occurred on the burdens or risks that come with decriminalising ganja.