How the Regulators Caused the Kalamazoo Air Crisis! - Cover - December 2020

 

My name is Brandi Crawford-Johnson and I’m sharing my story in hoping that it will bring awareness to other families and save lives.

This chapter of my life started in 2018 when I saw an article online saying Kalamazoo has the “Dirtiest Air in the Nation!” I have severe asthma so I wondered if there was a correlation. I immediately started searching the EPA website and applied to join The Kalamazoo Environmental Concerns Committee to try and help the committee clean up the air.

After I left the meeting the committee ignored my concerns and sent a cease and desist letter to everyone that reported on our air quality.

I then realized the evil I was facing. I spoke with EGLE aka MDEQ air enforcement and they assured me everything was fine. Fast forward to May 2020. My family was moving to Florida and the pandemic hit. We could not enter the state so I had to take what money I had left to find housing and the only one I could afford was in the same neighborhood I bought my other houses. Days after the remodel was done and we moved in, I started experiencing burning eyes and my asthma started flaring worse. I started researching Graphic Packaging International again. I read that they were expanding and felt fear instantly.

How could they expand a facility that is producing strong odors and releases toxic chemicals I thought. Then I became more suspicious. I began researching and talking to anyone that would listen and give me more information. I was in a fight to save my family. The adrenaline is constant as well as the fear. Here we are living in a pandemic with nowhere to go and we have to worry about being poisoned?

I found the Kalamazoo County Brownfield report first. I couldn’t believe what I was reading. Graphic Packaging was getting millions in tax breaks to expand to further poison us for 25 local jobs? Why would our city and county commissioners even vote for them to expand? Why would the City and County declare a Climate Emergency then vote to have a polluter expand to increase greenhouse emissions by 221%?!? Why would they let a company with soil and water samples this high even operate? Why wouldn’t they just relocate us or the hazardous plants near our houses? None of this made sense, so I kept studying.

 I called and emailed every single person in that whole agency and the EPA trying to get to the bottom of it and I was ignored. They had meetings with me but there was no action. I started to do FOIA requests at the city to find out what they had and got copies of H2S readings. It was all there in black and white. We were being gassed by Graphic Packaging and The Kalamazoo WasteWater Plant.

The city and State thought they were slick. They tried to play off the toxic gas leaks as an odor problem and we all never thought twice about it. It makes me wonder how many other communities are getting gassed?  

I kept speaking out publicly at city meetings and had zoom calls with EGLE and the EPA. One of my doctors spoke at a city commission meeting saying the neighborhood needs rezoned away from the hazardous facilities and that there are big death gaps between zip codes. His comment was ignored and not addressed. A retired employee from Graphic Packaging recently told me her whole department had cancer so I sent MIOSHA the reports as well.

Everyone blames each other. They had no resolution for us. I think it’s because they knew this was going to be another “Flint Water Crisis” scandal and they didn’t want to go to jail.

To add insult to injury, The City of Kalamazoo decided to cut down 721 trees for both toxic facilities to have our neighborhood deprived of oxygen while we were already choking on toxic air.

The stress and anxiety has been unbearable as I continue to fight to save everyone. Marijuana has helped me tremendously.

I can’t understand why it’s so heavily regulated yet toxic facilities that kill people are not! I pray that with my coalition of doctors we can get everyone help soon. The EPA says they are bringing air mobile units down next week but I’m not sure if they will relocate everyone. They had to know the only air monitor in our county was in an open air field at the county fair grounds, so I don’t trust them.

My neighborhood was redlined years ago and people cannot afford to relocate like my family just did.

The only help I can count on right now is my coalition of doctors and my lawyers I contacted to file a class action lawsuit to get help.

There is an EPA environmental justice tool that can help you identify your score of getting cancer and respiratory disease. You can enter your address. My neighborhood is in the 90th percentile and has an asthma hospitalization rate 5 times higher than anywhere in the region.

You must educate yourself on water toxins like PFAS. I just joined the state group to find out where all the PFAS are. They are chemicals that stay in our bodies forever and cause many diseases. Evil companies and certain government officials allowed this to happen.

We must fight for our own families and do our own research when it comes to our health.  We cannot depend on others to protect us because they may be evil. We must educate ourselves on environmental issues, racism, and discrimination against all races and incomes. This should be taught in schools. Environmental Justice is what we all deserve. I intend to continue this fight to get Justice for us.

Peace and love to you all.

(Brandi may be reached @brandijoy4 on IG)

John Sinclair - Free the Weed #114 - December 2020

 

A Column By John Sinclair

Hi everybody and welcome to post-Rump America. It’s just been a little less than a month since the presidential election, but it seems like 10 years already since we had to deal with that asshole as the leader of our battered nation, and I for one am vastly relieved and looking to the future with a whole different set of eyes.

This criminal bastard has tried every possible method of cancelling the will of the electorate and continuing his stay in office by any means necessary, but as of yesterday he seems to be giving up the ghost at last and letting the

people’s wishes take their appropriate course.

As a Detroit resident and a long-time registered Democrat, what galled me the most was his henchman Rudy Gugliani’s attempt to throw out the votes of those Wayne County citizens whose plurality was what turned the trick in Michigan and altered the outcome from -10,000 to +154,000 votes

against the despot.

To get rid of the Rump regime after four years of utter humiliation and chagrin is a beautiful thing, and I’m very happy to have been an integral part of the decisive vote in the state of Michigan, which helped elect this asshole four years ago when 60,000 voters refused to cast a vote for

president and the Rump won by 10,000 ballots.

This time more people voted than ever before in American history—the loser got more votes than any previous winner—and the only surprising thing is how many people stuck with Resident Rump after his disgraceful comportment as our president. This is doubtless the result of his 10 years

as the star of America’s favorite TV program and as the “boss” everyone loved to watch week after week in their living rooms.

This country started to go to shit when the CIA and the gangsters combined to assassinate President John F. Kennedy in 1963. It got worse when his successor, Lyndon B. Johnson, refused to run for reelection rather than give up on the War in Vietnam, turning things over to the scoundrel Richard M. Nixon for about six years before we could throw him out—but not before he was able to institute the War on Drugs in 1971, a stratagem that sent our country spinning down the toilet for the next 50 years.

Then, after the brief respite of four years of the great Jimmy Carter, America bought into the horseshit politics of the B movie actor Ronald Reagan and his successors in the Bush family, spelled only by the two terms of the phony Democrat, William Jefferson Clinton and his famous blow jobs alternating with his scrapping of the time-tested public welfare system and his embrace of the War on Drugs.

Throughout this entire period, and continuing into the otherwise exemplary eight years of the Obama-Biden administration, all government bodies clung to the War on Drugs as the powerful centerpiece of the police state society they were busy creating out of what used to be America, and

only the tireless efforts of the warriors of the marijuana legalization movement were able to make a change in the system big enough to benefit the rest of us.

Now a writer called Kyle Jaeger has filed a report titled WHAT JOE BIDEN’S PRESIDENTIAL VICTORY MEANS FOR MARIJUANA IN 2021 and leads with the conclusion that if Biden fulfills a key campaign promise once he gets to the White House, federal marijuana reform will be part of his administration’s legacy.

“Although the former vice president has embraced decriminalizing cannabis possession,” Jaeger writes, “he has faced criticism over pushing punitive anti-drug legislation during his time in the Senate. And reform advocates have similarly taken him to task over his refusal to join the majority of U.S. voters and a supermajority of those in his own party in embracing broad adult-use marijuana legalization.

“But the political dynamics that will define marijuana policy in 2021,” Jaeger adds, ”go beyond the presidency. The fate of reform still rests largely on Congress. But it’s unclear at this point which party will control the Senate next year. Democratic leaders have pledged an end to federal marijuana prohibition, and if the party wins the majority (following the two Georgia Senate elections in January), the stage will be set for far-reaching reform.

“Unlike President Trump,” Jaeger continues, “Biden has said that his administration will pursue marijuana decriminali-zation and expungements for people with prior cannabis convictions. He also favors medical cannabis legalization, modestly rescheduling marijuana under federal law and letting states set their own policies without federal intervention.  ‘We should decriminalize marijuana,’ Biden said during a town hall event last month. ‘I don’t believe anybody should be going ot jail for drug use.’ But at that same event, he again offered his vision for an alternative to incarceration for drug crimes that many advocates oppose: forced drug treatment.”

Jaeger notes that Biden will be joined by Vice-President Kamala Harris when he enters the Oval Office. The senator, he points out, became the lead Senate sponsor of a comprehensive bill to end federal prohibition last year. Harris said last month, Jaeger reports, that she has a “deal” with Biden to candidly share her perspective on a range of progressive policies he currently opposes, including legalizing marijuana, but she hasn’t indicated that she would

proactively push him in that direction.

“The senator also said,” Jaeger continues, “that the administration would have a commitment to decriminalizing marijuana and expunging the records of people who have been convicted of marijuana offenses.” Biden, for his part, has conceded that his work on punitive anti-drug legislation was a ‘mistake.’

“That said,” Jaeger adds, “shortly after becoming the party’s 2020 nominee, the former vice president’s ongoing opposition to recreational legalization is suspected of being at least partly behind the Democratic National Committee platform committee’s vote against adding the reform as a 2020 party plank in July.

“With a Democratic-controlled Senate and the party still in control of the House,” Jaeger says, “it stands to reason that cannabis reform would move in the 117 th Congress, even if the pace of that reform and the administration’s role in promoting it remain uncertain.

“It is also not entirely out of the question that a scaled-down proposal to simply protect people complying with state marijuana laws from federal interference—likely without the social equity and restorative justice components of Schumer’s bill or the MORE Act—could see the light of day.

“That possibility is boosted by the fact that voters in several Republican and swing states approved cannabis ballot measures on Election Day. Sen. John Thune (R-SD), the party’s whip, for example, now represents constituents who voted to legalize both recreational and medical marijuana by solid margins.

In conclusion, Jaeger points out that “the president has the unilateral authority to grant acts of clemency, including pardons and commutations, to people who have been convicted of federal marijuana or other drug offenses. He also gets to appoint an attorney general, drug czar and other officials who will make decisions on how the federal government handles the issue -though many of those officials will be subject to Senate confirmation.

For his part, Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR) told Marijuana Moment in August that “the Biden administration and a Biden Department of Justice would be a constructive player in advancing legalization.”

“But in the end,” Jaeger sums up, “Biden remains out of step with the majority of his party and U.S. voters more broadly on the question of legalization. That said, his recent pivot in favor of decriminalization and medical cannabis legalization indicates that he recognizes that a tough-on-crime approach to drugs is no longer politically acceptable to voters and signals that further evolution in his position on cannabis is possible.”

FREE THE WEED, Mr. President! It’s your turn now.

Tinfoil Hat Time! December 2020

 

The plan was to change the title image once the election had ended.  The new plan is to change the title image from within a bunker seven miles beneath the Earth’s crust while WW3 breaks out overhead, brother turning on brother, in an age old battle between individual liberty and centralized authority.  As if we all did not expect exactly this sort of finale to 2020, if not at least in the back of our tinfoil covered minds.

There are about a million and a half plus one ways to steer this month’s column, and none of them seem terribly accurate.  Faith based news abounds.  Are the high paid dolled up news anchors telling the truth?  Are the citizens who signed affidavits telling the truth?  Is Donald Trump telling the truth?  Is Joe Biden telling the truth?  Are the MIT analysts who declared a 99% chance software was being used in Michigan to alter votes telling the truth?  Are the whistleblowing employees telling the truth?  Are the lawyers telling the truth?  Are the judges telling the truth?  Rumor rides her chariot, circling the confused masses in a victory lap. 

Only one thing is certain regardless of the legal outcome of the election.  The ‘Office of the President-Elect’ is not a real office of anything.  It’s nothing more than a show on TV.  Check the fact checks.  Professor Leonard Steinhorn at American University told Reuters that the term is not an official term, his exact words quoted as being, “As I understand it, there’s nothing in the law that specifies an official or government-approved Office of the President-elect.”  The show first aired featuring Barack Obama, was then hosted by Donald Trump, and now guest stars Joe Biden.  A historical part of the United States of America’s system of government it is not. 

Tinfoil Hat Time is here in more ways than one, and odds are there are a whole lot more people sporting shiny silver headgear these days.  Mask or tinfoil hat, tellingly enough, seem to be the sides by which we divide.

But enough about politics.  Let’s talk business.  That’s where facts, cold hard numbers, are rather easy to come by.  That sort of information is verified.  Bragged about.  Made public record in demonstration of glory, and pursuit of opportunity.  

How many are already familiar with Rupert Murdoch and Fox Corporation, who loom over Fox News, and their $21 billion in assets?  

Now how many realize that what accounts for ‘reliable information’ on ABC is provided by the Walt Disney Corporation, a company estimated to have over $200 billion in assets?  Or that ‘truths’ told on NBC are brought to you by Comcast/Universal Studios and their over $263 billion in assets?  Do the people know that the ‘news’ on CNN is a product of AT&T/Time Warner/AOL, a company with an astounding $551 billion plus in assets? 

These ultra rich corporations own almost every mainstream network and movie studio.  Every TV channel and show.  All the political opinion shows.  All the children’s movies and animated films.  All the romantic comedies.  All the action flicks.  Almost all the beloved intellectual properties from Marvel to Star Wars, Star Trek, Disney, and beyond lay in the hands of these massive businesses.  They even provide ‘educational content’ for taxpayer funded public schools.

Companies who have acquired a combined trillion dollars in assets peddling fantasies.  Producing fictions.  Plagiarizing classic themes.  Placing ads that tug on your emotions, then charging you fees.  Promoting division and destroying civil discourse.  Constructing toll roads on the information superhighway.  Sensationalizing gossip.  Selling you things you do not need or want.  Lying about when the cable guy will show up.  Providing the complete opposite of transparency in either their billing, or their business associations.  Animating and peddling co-opted folk tales from other cultures.  Preying on your wallet via nostalgia and your childrens’ desires.  The list goes on and on.

  

It takes conditioned ignorance on a scale this world has never before seen in order for tens of millions of people to get their information from The Fox Corporation, The Walt Disney Corporation, Comcast/Universal Studios, and AT&T/Time Warner/AOL, and then believe themselves to be hearing the truth, to believe themselves to be more informed than others, and to believe themselves to be fighting against rich corporations in any way.

The subsidiaries of these mega businesses, otherwise known as ‘trusted news sources’, are by account of fact nothing more than properties owned by corporations.  Parts of a larger business operation that spans a wide range of interconnected and highly profitable goods and services.  A link in a money making chain that, just like every other pack of subsidiaries, in every other industry, works synergistically toward the goal of making the parent more money.  It’s just business, as usual.  They do not get more honest if more people listen to them, they just make more money and become more powerful.

In fact, over the past few decades telecommunications, broadcast, and information technology companies have been consolidating like inverse rabbits.  Slowly but surely (and quietly thanks to being the ones who own the ‘news’) joining their empires in an ever upward lust for more.  Merger upon merger, buyout after buyout, they have grown into global nightmares.

MSNBC (which is MSN), for instance, started as a joint effort between Microsoft and General Electric’s NBC unit, which was then purchased and is now a part of Comcast/Universal Studios.  As a purely hypothetical example, in one fell swoop this single multi headed business entity could use its ‘news’ to tell everyone to be afraid of a virus, control searches for information on the topic, convince people of their reality by integrating it into trusted TV shows, advertise intellectual properties in public service announcements for free as a tax write off, then make millions off virtual meeting software and services, all while landing an owner a key role at the center of finding the cure.  Each mouth lending credentials to the other in a single unified goal, profiting all the way.  With control over perception, information, and communications, there really is no end to what could be accomplished. 

They have no authority over truth, other than assumed authority and advertising budget, which costs them zero as long as it’s covered under their own umbrella, or less than zero when its a government backed PSA.  An argument could be made for longevity being the mark of trust, that age gives them rights.  In which case it should be noted that CNN, which first aired June 1st 1980, is two months younger than the author of this column. 

Google it.  Check it out on Bing.  Do a Yahoo search.  Ask Jeeves.  Look it up on AOL if you are feeling old school.  It makes no difference.  Almost all search networks are either owned by, or powered by, Google or Microsoft Bing.  They’ll all tell you the same thing.  In the case of some, such as AOL, it’s a deal between AT&T/Time Warner/AOL and Microsoft, the same Microsoft partnered with Comcast/Universal Studios on MSNBC.  Some tentacles specializing in communications technology, fictional stories, and ‘news’, others in information technology, data processing and…

...vaccines?

Rumor can ride her chariot all she likes ‘round the game of politics, business is where the facts reside.  As the third season of ‘The Office of the President-Elect’ is transmitted via cable networks onto digital devices and TVs that run on software, and quietly collect data, in homes all across this nation, one more thing is solidified in at least this tinfoil covered mind.  To steal the words of Gil Scott-Heron, “The revolution will not be televised.”  

Michigan News - December 2020

 

How are They Stealing the Michigan Medical Marijuana Program?

Lansing- A select group of lawmakers are working behind the scenes to redraft the Michigan cannabis laws to merge the Michigan Marijuana Licensing Facilities Act (MMFLA) and the Michigan Medical Marijuana Act (MMMA) under one piece of legislation. The most current draft of this language was released by Matt Abel from Cannabis Council and executive director of the Michigan Chapter of Norml. 

Draft 8 is the latest version of this bill that disassembles the MMMA, and is jam packed with commercial interests. Medical marijuana is soon to be a thing of the past if lobbyists and the state of Michigan has their way. Not in the bill is the memorandum from the Marijuana Regulatory Agency (MRA), which will soon have complete control of the voters’ initiated laws that legalize medical marijuana and adult use in Michigan, which advises local municipalities around the state to embrace state tax and regulated marijuana facilities and crack down on the caregivers who have been helping medical marijuana patients for ten years. 

Notably no deaths of medical marijuana patients ever happened in Michigan, until licensed marijuana facilities distributed tainted vape cartridges that contained harmful vitamin e thinners. At least two people died and 2700 injured. Although this was reported by mainstream news sources as a product of the Black Market, thousands of carts were recalled from licensed facilities in Michigan. Can Michiganders trust the government to take control of Medical Marijuana? One thing is for sure, thousands of patients and caregivers have been producing good clean medical marijuana for years.

Tim Beck, Michigan’s grandfather of cannabis law reform, points out one thing, “Looks like Caregivers will be doing good business for years,” he commented when discussing the exceptionally good prices for cannabis that is being exported on the Black Market to states that have yet to reform their marijuana laws. In full disclosure, Mr. Beck admits that medical marijuana was just a means to an end for full legalization of marijuana. 

AU Approved in the D

Detroit- It is official, the city of Detroit has approved adult use licensing.  In a unanimous decision City Council approved an ordinance that meets, then exceeds, those in other parts of the state by being the first City to green light consumption lounges.

Detroit had delayed it’s approval in order to construct what they felt was a more comprehensive social equity program in an effort to correct for the War on Drugs. 

The new ordinance guarantees “Detroit Legacy” applicants, those who have lived in the city for at least one year, fifteen of the last thirty years, thirteen of the last thirty years and are low income, or ten of the last thirty years and have a prior conviction, will receive special treatment.  No less than 50% of all licenses will be awarded to “Detroit Legacy” applicants, who are also eligible to purchase certain city-owned properties for a 25% discount.

Interested Detroit legacy qualifiers may begin sending applications to The City of Detroit Civil Rights, Inclusion and Opportunity Department in January 2021.  All other applications for adult use licensing will be accepted beginning April 1, 2021, by the Building, Safety Engineering and Environmental Department.

MI Recreational Sales Approach $440 Million

Michigan- As year one of the adult use market in Michigan comes to a close total sales are reported at nearly $440 million.  Since Dec. 1, 2019, roughly 200 provisioning centers have began selling recreational weed, generating an estimated $26.4 million in sales tax and $44 million in excise tax.

Analysts predict this number will increase as more counties accept adult use licensing.  At current only 84 of the 1,764 communities have approved rec, with Detroit recently adding its name to the ranks.

MLive Advertising Big Cannabis, Provides Aditorials

Michigan- According to multiple sources, aditorials on MLive have surfaced promoting big cannabis businesses presented as news.  Gage, Common Citizen, and Lume Cannabis Co. have all benefited from what the urban dictionary defines as “an article that seems to offer sage advice but is really intended to move product; an advertorial.”

In one recent example a Nov 30, 2020 article titled ‘Take a look inside the city of Jackson’s first marijuana retailer’ (found at https://www.mlive.com/news/jackson/2020/11/take-a-look-inside-the-city-of-jacksons-first-marijuana-retailer.html) opening day for Lume Cannabis Co. in Jackson is covered, at length.  Starting with vague rough estimates of first day customer numbers quoted by Lume compliance manager and launch team leader Joseph Stankowski, it moves into detailing the stores address and hours of operation, and briefly touches on the products available on the menu.  In the final paragraph of the article MLive mentions but does not name the “several other” marijuana shops in surrounding townships, and the “two other” retailers seeking licensing.

National News - December 2020

 

2020 State Cannabis Election Results

Medical Marijuana- Voters approved the legalization of medical cannabis access in two states,
Mississippi and South Dakota. In Mississippi, voters chose between two dueling initiatives — favoring a measure placed on the ballot by patient advocates, and rejected a more restrictive alternative measure placed on the ballot by state lawmakers. 

Recreational Cannabis- Voters legalized the possession of marijuana by adults in Arizona, Montana, New Jersey, and in South Dakota. The measures in Arizona, Montana, and South Dakota each permit adults to possess and cultivate marijuana for personal use and establish a regulated retail market. In New Jersey, voters decided on a public ballot question. Lawmakers must now enact enabling legislation in order to amend state laws to comport it with the voters’ decision. 

In total, 15 states have now either enacted or have voted to enact adult-use legalization laws, while 36 states have either enacted or have voted to enact medical marijuana access laws.

San Francisco Renters Up in Non-Smoke

California- San Francisco Supervisor, Norman Yee is about to retire. On his agenda is a ban on the
smoking of cannabis in apartments that will be considered by the San Francisco Board of Supervisors on December first. This proposal is a major setback for cannabis consumers who will be forced to leave their homes to light up. 

While an amendment to the proposal has been offered that would exempt patients with a valid and current medical cannabis card issued by the State of California, the proposal fails to protect the many patients who no longer participate in the state’s medical cannabis program since the legalization of cannabis in 2016. 

Social Equity and Shrooms Carpet Bag NJ Legalizations 

New Jersey- Following New Jersey’s legalization last month, the states legislators now hold the ball on
crafting the language for adult use per the passing of the public ballot question. However, creating a legislative pathway to reach proponents’ goals to establish New Jersey as the dominant East Coast marijuana market, while ending the disproportionate rates of arrest in minority communities is far more complicated then expected.

New Jersey’s senate voted to amend a decriminalization bill to include psilocybin, the hallucinogenic compound in so-called magic mushrooms, hamstringing the time-sensitive negotiations over a separate legalization bill. That bill creates a framework for the constitutional amendment legalizing marijuana, which takes effect Jan. 1.The mushroom amendment was tacked on just as social justice advocates were spotlighting what they saw as an overarching flaw in the legalization bill: a lack of guaranteed benefit to Black and Latino communities that have suffered most from criminal enforcement of marijuana laws. The legalization bill was pulled back for an overhaul. After lengthy Assembly and Senate committee hearings, two bills emerged that differed meaningfully, and a final vote on the legislation, was postponed.

Once a bill is signed into law, existing medical marijuana dispensaries are expected to be permitted to sell excess cannabis to adults. But supply is limited, and it is likely to take at least 18 months for new shops catering specifically to the adult-use market to open.

Wholesale U.S. Oil Prices at a Glance

Prices of marijuana and hemp oil have fallen from a year ago, according to industry experts, reflecting
rising oil production that has more than offset an uptick in cannabis sales amid the coronavirus pandemic.The drop in wholesale oil prices reflects several market factors.

Marijuana demand, for starters, rose after dozens of states declared cannabis businesses essential and allowed them to stay open during the pandemic. Consumers stocked up and have continued to drive marijuana sales month-over-month.

In response, cultivators have been growing plentiful supplies of raw cannabis, from which oil is derived.

That, in turn, has put downward pressure on oil prices – despite robust demand for oil-derived products such as concentrates, edibles and vape pens.

A gram of marijuana distillate oil testing at 90% THC is selling in Colorado for around $7-$9 a gram.  That’s down from 2019, when a gram was selling for around $11-$12, he said.  More hemp farms are coming online all the time, producing more biomass and forcing down oil prices.

World News - December 2020

 

Mexico Goes Legal

Mexico- The Mexican Senate recently passed a bill containing a draft federal law for the regulation of all
marijuana. The bill includes amendments to the General Health Law and the Federal Criminal Code and is amended by a helpful Annex. The Cannabis Law is being sent to the Mexican Lower Chamber (Cámara de Diputados) for discussion and hopefully, approval.  Amendments to Mexico’s General Health Law and Federal Criminal Code allowed for the following:

       1. Limited cannabis use and consumption for qualified patients.

       2. Possession of cannabis for undertaking medical research.

       3. The import and export of medical cannabis products.

In 2018, Mexico’s Supreme Court declared Mexico’s general prohibition against adult use cannabis unconstitutional and required Mexico’s Ministry of Health, COFEPRIS (Federal Commission for the Protection against Sanitary Risks), and various other Mexican governmental agencies issue regulations establishing a commercial cannabis chain for cannabis distribution.

A Mexican Supreme Court ruling last year mandated the Ministry of Health publish regulations for medical cannabis use and make the 2017 amendments effective by September 2020. However, this has not happened yet. Mexico’s Cannabis Law that has just been recently approved by the Mexican Senate seeks to comply with the 2018 mandate and this new law is expected to go into effect by December 15th.

The Cannabis Law will regulate recreational and industrial (hemp) use in Mexico but it does not address medical cannabis use which is already legal and will be regulated by draft Medical Regulations which we expect will be published in the Federation Official Gazette at or around the same time as the Cannabis Law is approved,  early December, 2020.

The United Nations and Global Cannabis Regulation

Vienna- The medical cannabis industry could be in for one of its biggest symbolic wins in decades if a
United Nations vote next week implicitly acknowledges the medical value of the drug.

During its reconvened session in December, the United Nations Commission on Narcotic Drugs (CND) could, with a simple majority vote in an online meeting broadcasted from Vienna, accept a World Health Organization (WHO) recommendation to remove cannabis and cannabis resin from Schedule IV of the 1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs.

The CND’s adoption of the recommendation should prompt a domino effect of positive effects for the cannabis industry, justifying medical legalization efforts at national levels around the world and potentially positioning countries to broaden regulations.  The vote was postponed in March 2020 to give CND member states time to “clarify the implications and consequences of, as well as the reasoning for, these recommendations.”

Between June and October, U.N.-member states had three, closed “topical meetings” followed by an “intersessional meeting” to allow participants to exchange perspectives.

Germany Talking Imports

Germany- Cannabis producer Little Green Pharma became the first Australian company to send its
medical cannabis oil to Germany for sale to the public.  Australia joins Canada, and other nations, in supplying the German market with cannabis oil products.

Roughly 789 liters of cannabis oil was shipped to Germany from Canada last year, according to the Canadian government.

Little Green Pharma said the shipment contained cannabis oil worth more than 600,000 Australian dollars ($436,000).  The oil was shipped to German medical distributor CC Pharma, a subsidiary of Canada’s Aphria.  Little Green Pharma said it expects the product to clear customs soon, followed by batch testing, before being released for sale into the German market.Shipping medical marijuana to the European Union is complicated.

Little Green Pharma said it took 22 months to complete negotiations, quality inspections, audits and the procurement of German and Australian narcotic licenses and permits.

The process “reflects the high regulatory barriers to the export of medicinal cannabis products to the EU,” according to the company’s news release.  Marijuana businesses have expended a considerable amount of time and money establishing a toehold in the promising German market.  But so far the rewards have been few and far between, with most international companies recording marginal revenue in the growing, but crowded, market.  The German market remains a distant second to Canada’s by expenditures – though that is expected to change in the coming years.