Marijuana businesses flourish in Canada amid COVID pandemic
Amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the marijuana business has turned into a flourishing trade in Canada with more and more shops opening each day.
In a recent report by The New York Times, Canada's main city of Toronto was described as the "Wild West of Marijuana Shops."
According to the report, Ontario's provincial government permitted the shops by emergency order to keep operating during the COVID pandemic, even during lockdowns.
In March 2020, during the early months of the pandemic, there were only 12 cannabis shops, but now there are 430 shops, with another 88 in the approval process.
During this period, to the investors’ delight, shares and stocks of licensed medical marijuana growers in Canada have multiplied in price.
However, the marijuana business was already expected to flourish.
Even before the pandemic started in 2019 and right after Canada' Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, to fulfill a campaign promise, introduced legislation to legalize the recreational use of marijuana in Canada, the prospects looked good.
Eventually, the government of Canada legalized cannabis for recreational use on October 17, 2018.
The Cannabis Act "creates a legal and regulatory framework for controlling the production, distribution, sale and possession of cannabis in Canada", as stated in a Government of Canada website.
Under the Canadian cannabis law, adult users can possess up to 30 grams of legally-produced cannabis. Adults can also grow up to four cannabis plants per household.
Canada is now the second nation, after Uruguay, to completely legalize marijuana as a consumer product.
However, growing, importing, exporting or selling marijuana, particularly to minors, outside licensed channels remain a serious crime.
Meanwhile, critics of the Cannabis Law highlight the damaging impact to society of the widespread use of the drugs.
Widespread use of more potent recreational marijuana, according to Brent Zettl, the president and chief executive of CanniMed Therapeutics in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, could undermine efforts to understand the drug’s medicinal effects, particularly for users looking for relief, not a high.
“It’s good from an industry perspective,” Zettl said of the cannabis law. “I don’t think it’s good for society.”
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