by
Dan Mitchell on February 10, 2021
As the Biden administration prepares to regulate hemp and CBD products, it faces a unique challenge: creating a set of rules meant to rein in an essentially rule-free, chaotic industry.
State laws and regulations exist, of course, but those are often spottily enforced, and even in the best of circumstances add to the confusion by forcing companies to adhere to a patchwork of laws to operate nationally. Fly-by-night outfits take advantage of this by essentially ignoring regulations, but that makes it even harder for the more legitimate players struggling to maintain their reputations.
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by
Dan Mitchell on February 3, 2021
The California cannabis industry has gone to great lengths to present itself as a good corporate citizen comprising companies operating with the community’s best interests at heart.
This is especially true when it comes to environmental issues in an industry that has a long history of environmentalism among growers, dating from decades before weed was a legal crop. Now, as industry members push for legalization and to win the favor of state regulators, local officials and the general public, they continue to try to be environmentally friendly.
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by
Dan Mitchell on January 27, 2021
President Biden has moved swiftly to issue a record number of executive orders, most of them undoing some of former President Trump’s administrative policies on such issues as the environment and immigration. This is meant as a sign that it’s a new day, and that Biden means business.
Pot advocates are hopeful Biden and Congress will behave similarly on cannabis policies, but that’s far from a forgone conclusion, even as new bills to expand opportunities for pot research and use are introduced by lawmakers. But the new administration is dealing with several emergencies at once, including the Covid-19 pandemic and, bizarrely enough, threats from insurrectionists. It might be a while before any major new cannabis policies, up to and including full federal legalization, are enacted.
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by
Mike Huguenor on January 20, 2021
Last July, as the local economy scrambled to survive the third month of the coronavirus pandemic, Spotify CEO Daniel Ek took to Twitter with some economic figures of his own.
“Excited to announce our Q2 numbers showing strong growth across the board,” Ek tweeted on July 29, 2020.
Linked in the tweet was an infographic touting the company’s 299 million monthly listeners, recent expansion to Russia, and exclusive podcasts with former First Lady Michelle Obama and bro-losopher Joe Rogan.
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by
Dan Mitchell on January 20, 2021
Before the runoff U.S. Senate elections in Georgia earlier this month, most pot advocates were ready to accept that the GOP and Mitch McConnell would hold on to the upper chamber, meaning that any substantive reform of federal cannabis laws would have to wait at least two years. Those advocates were–completely understandably–pessimistic.
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by
Dan Mitchell on January 13, 2021
Cannabis and spiritually have always been intertwined, with various degrees of validity and seriousness.
It was used as an entheogen (a psychoactive substance used in religious practices) as far back as ancient India, and some Hindus still consume bhang, an elixir that contains cannabis, in their spiritual practices. The Buddhist Mahakala Tantra specifically mentions cannabis as a medicinal plant. Cannabis is, of course, central to Rastafarianism.
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by
Dan Mitchell on January 6, 2021
The pandemic has brought the cannabis industry a strange mix of outcomes—things that were to be expected alongside surprises both good and bad. Now, as a vaccine rolls out, few know what to expect in 2021 and beyond.
It wasn’t surprising cannabis sales took off after stay-at-home orders were issued last spring as the Covid-19 pandemic took hold in the United States, just as it wasn’t surprising that sales dipped a month or so later.
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by
Dan Mitchell on December 30, 2020
As 2020 dawned, most observers of the California cannabis industry expected it to be an eventful year for the legal-weed business and it was–but not in a way that anybody expected.
Over a swoon-inducing couple of weeks in March, when Bay Area and state officials issued shutdown orders as the Covid-19 pandemic took hold, it looked at first like the industry, forced to shut down, might sink into oblivion. Soon enough, though, county and state governments declared cannabis to be an essential business, saving the day.
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by
Dan Mitchell on December 23, 2020
Research, or the lack of it, is one not insignificant reason the cannabis industry is in the strange stage of limbo it’s lived in for years: bifurcated, highly restricted with different rules from state-to-state and without much opportunity for grants to deepen our understanding of the plant.
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by
Dan Mitchell on December 16, 2020
As 2020 crawls to a close, the California pot industry is looking back with a mix of relief and chagrin at a year that was supposed to be filled with big strides, but was instead filled with relatively small wins.
Industry relief comes in the form of the state deeming pot an essential business that could keep operating despite the pandemic lockdowns. The Chagrin is because as the year began, the expectation was that taxes would be lowered, some regulations eased, and the three agencies that govern the state’s pot industry consolidated into one. The state government, stymied by the pandemic, didn’t address any of that.
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