High fees and regulatory hoops have left many in the cannabis industry locked out of the legal marketplace.
A Florida-based company is now the nation’s largest weed corporation, leaving Black growers behind.
Coast to coast, the green rush is failing Black growers and entrepreneurs.
In the state’s cannabis industry, some businesses are less equal than others.
Trimmers make from $100 to $300 for a day that can run 15 hours. The bad gigs are the grows where weapons are numerous and the bosses are stressed out and high.
Co-published by Fast Company
Bryant Mitchell drove the 450 miles between Los Angeles and Guerneville twice a week, learning, among other facets of horticulture, how distillation practices could be applied to making marijuana concentrates. In time he would become a master grower.
Co-published by Fast Company
Oakland’s cannabis equity program may have gotten off to an awkward start, but it is spreading across the state and beyond.
Will the marijuana El Dorado bring new wealth to California and its inhabitants, or will it produce an historic buzz kill?
As San Francisco and San Diego counties moved forward with automatic resentencing for old cannabis-related crimes, the Los Angeles District Attorney’s office balked — saying, in effect, that people with convictions were on their own.
Last Wednesday the Drug Policy Alliance, a New York-based drug-reform nonprofit, held a media conference call meant to celebrate a successful election night. Voters in eight states had legalized cannabis for recreational purposes; in several more states ballot measures cleared the way for marijuana’s medical use.
A four-month pilot program to control and confirm medical cannabis from Humboldt County began August 1, and will be extended another month through the end of the year. The program, dubbed “track and trace,” involves growers, manufacturers and dispensers in compliance with Humboldt’s Medical Marijuana Land Use Ordinance.
When we speak of legalizing marijuana we are really speaking of the Great Cannabis Debate. Come November, Californians will vote on Proposition 64, the Adult Use of Marijuana Act, which could bring safety and security for both cannabis consumers and farmers, and the sales taxes accrued could provide much-needed revenue to our state.
In February of 2013, the employees of Wellness Connection, a medical marijuana provider based in Auburn, Maine, were worried about their product. They’d observed mold and fungus on their plants too often; bugs were infesting their work areas. Some of the chemicals they were being asked to use, such as the insecticide pyrethrin, had known health effects.
In his sunny office on the edge of town in Arcata, California, Scott Greacen pulls up a slideshow on his large high-resolution monitor. As wildflowers sway in the wind outside a window, a woodsy guitar solo starts to play along with the pictures. Greacen mutes it; he wants to focus on destruction.
Rural Trinity County is home to 13,500 people in Northern California and marijuana production is rampant there. Along with Humboldt and Mendocino counties, Trinity comprises California’s “Emerald Triangle,” a region known for its prolific marijuana farming. Hayfork is Trinity County’s second largest town, and an area of concentrated production.
As California voters prepare to make a historic decision about legalizing the recreational use of marijuana, promises and omens have become part of the debate.