Senator Steve Daines, the lead Republican Senate cosponsor of a bipartisan cannabis banking bill, has revealed that a planned floor vote is on hold until he can be certain that the measure will pass in the GOP-controlled House, according to a conversation between him and Rob Sechrist, a marijuana financing executive. Daines emphasized that he wants to ensure the bill’s success in the House rather than seeing it “die” there.
This marks a significant shift in rhetoric, as Chuck Schumer, the Senate Majority Leader, had previously expressed his intent to bring the Secure and Fair Enforcement Regulation (SAFER) Banking Act to the Senate floor without mentioning any dependence on House dynamics. However, given the uncertain House dynamics and the recent removal of Rep. Kevin McCarthy as House speaker, Daines is taking a cautious approach.
The House’s changing political landscape has raised doubts about the fate of the cannabis banking bill. Advocates are closely watching the selection of the new House speaker, as their stance on cannabis reform could affect the bill’s chances. Several potential candidates have emerged, but their positions on cannabis reform vary, making the bill’s fate uncertain.
The absence of a House speaker also means that no legislation can advance in the House, which further complicates the bill’s prospects. With various pressing priorities for Congress, including funding the government and providing aid to Israel, the bill’s floor time is limited.
In addition to these challenges, there is uncertainty about the nature of the bill the GOP-controlled House would be willing to pass. Schumer has discussed amending the bill to include measures such as expunging prior cannabis records and protecting gun rights for marijuana users. Senator Raphael Warnock and others have suggested equity-centered amendments, but disagreements persist.
The bill had already faced delays due to partisan disagreements over certain sections favored by Republicans, particularly regarding ideological discrimination. While lawmakers have revised the bill, concerns remain, and reaching a consensus between the House and Senate remains a challenge.
Some Republican senators, including Tom Cotton and Chuck Grassley, have expressed concerns about the bill, with differing interpretations of Schumer’s intentions to amend it. Additionally, a group of senators, including Pete Ricketts, John Cornyn, Ted Budd and James Lankford, wrote a letter opposing the SAFER Banking Act, citing concerns about the cannabis industry and the banking system’s integrity.
Despite bipartisan momentum, a recent survey revealed that only about 1 in 10 congressional staffers believes the marijuana banking bill will pass this year, indicating the uncertain outlook for the legislation.
Companies such as Aurora Cannabis Inc. (NASDAQ: ACB) (TSX: ACB) will probably follow the goings-on on Capitol Hill to see whether marijuana banking is finally eased and the industry gets a chance to access capital like other legal businesses.
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A former Tesla director has donated $16 million to Harvard University to fund psychedelic research in culture and society. Antonio Gracias is donating $16 million to the academic institution via the Gracias Family Foundation to further psychedelic research in a newly established Study of Psychedelics in Society and Culture at Harvard University.
The study will draw researchers from Harvard Law School, Harvard Divinity School and the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. The study will focus on producing state-of-the-art scholarship as well as convening faculty, experts and students to discuss the implications of the burgeoning therapeutic psychedelics industry.
A recent surge in psychedelic research has found that psychedelic drugs such as LSD, MDMA and psilocybin have the potential to treat a myriad of mental disorders with barely any side effects. This research may still be in its infancy, but the results have been so promising that Big Pharma as well as institutional investors have begun investing millions of dollars into the research and development of psychedelic-related treatments.
Robin Kelsey, the Shirley Carter Burden Professor of Photography and Dean of Arts and Humanities at Harvard University, says the institution is thrilled to bring researchers, students and faculty together to discuss the increasingly important issue of psychedelics. Kelsey notes that Harvard, the country’s most prestigious academic institution, is “uniquely poised” to become a rallying place for people looking to discuss, debate and innovate in the nascent psychedelics sector.
The $16 million donation from the Gracias Family Foundation will support research efforts across Harvard University and include an endowed professorship. According to Valor Equity Partners founder, CEO and chief investment officer Antonio Gracias, Harvard University is a suitable place to look at psychedelics from different angles and aid in the creation of a framework to ensure psychedelics are legal and safe and have a positive impact on society.
His foundation has an interest in the therapeutic potential of psychedelics, a topic that has captured the attention of the general public, researchers, and lawmakers.
Psychedelic drugs have shown that they can offer long-term relief against several mental-health disorders at relatively minimal doses and with few side effects, a feat most mental health treatments cannot achieve. Up to one-third of people do not respond to antidepressants, and those who do often have to deal with side effects such as erectile dysfunction, hallucinations, confusion, agitation and constipation.
Consequently, the market is primed for novel treatments such as psychedelics that can offer long-term relief, are safe to use and don’t require daily doses.
This study at Harvard will provide great complementary information to the data coming out of the drug-development efforts of many companies such as Compass Pathways PLC (NASDAQ: CMPS).
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Man must face the perils of worldly passion if he is to secure the precious pearl of Enlightenment. He must first be lost among the mountainous crags of egoism and selfishness, before there will awaken in him the desire to find a path that will lead him to Enlightenment.” ~Buddha
It all seems so serene and peaceful, so smooth and effortless, so tranquil and full of light. But it’s not gentle and sweet. It’s jagged and elusive. It’s not artificially blissful; it’s authentically painful. It’s not pretend-forgiving; it’s ruthlessly absolving. Indeed. Some brutally hard shit must hit some unpleasantly fast fans before you can even think about placing a single toe on the Path toward Providence. Too heavy of a colloquialism for you? Okay, try this: before you can experience the stillness on the tip of the iceberg of illumination, you must first have reconciled the hidden iceberg of annihilation. Too cryptic for you? Fair enough…
Here it is, plain and simple: It has to hurt first. In a word – heartbreak. First your ego’s heart has to break, then your soul’s heart has to break. You need to go through a meta-ton of pain: mental, physical and spiritual –soul-caliber pain, tantamount to existential proportions, far exceeding the trivial pain of the hyperreal plane. Then, and only then, may you proceed along the path.
But remember, the pain doesn’t end there. Many a Buddha will pop up along the way trying to convince you that you’ve made it –that you’ve achieved the spiritual Mecca, that you’ve earned the elusive Philosopher’s Stone, that you’ve secured the sharp-as-god Golden Ratio, that you’ve merited the Sacred Phi of enlightenment. But you haven’t. And you should do as Linji Yixuan suggested, “If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him.” Indeed. The journey must remain the thing. From heartbreak to soulbreak…
Heartbreak:
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.” ~Mark Twain
Heartbreak is the end of innocence; the realization that this world does not belong to you, but that you belong to it. It’s only when the independent blood in your veins recalibrates into interdependent lifeblood, and the earth in your bones rectifies its posture as a force of nature first and a human second, that you understand yourself as the world and the world as yourself.
It hurts because it’s the end of unreasonable expectations. It’s an embracing of the cosmic joke, and the irrefutable fact that you’re the butt-end of it. But like the Dread Pirate Roberts tells the princess in The Princess Bride, “Life is pain, Highness. Anyone who says differently is selling something.”
This is authentic heartbreak, precise heartbreak. Not pretend sorrow or fairytale anguish, nor whiney, all-the-world-please-pity-me, unrequited romantic love. But the genuine death of your innocence, the warm-blooded murder of your naïveté. It’s discovering within you that which is the closest thing to immortality a mortal can achieve. As Pema Chodron said, “Only to the extent that we can expose ourselves over and over to annihilation can that which is indestructible in us be found.”
True heartbreak is annihilation. It’s ego-death. It’s the birth-death-rebirth cycle spiraling out inside you. It’s your caterpillar-self dissolving into a vital butterfly-self within the cocoon of your spirit. What comes out the other side is your budding soul, nascent and ready to flourish, but still reeking of ego residue.
Everything is turned upside down. The basket you once held all your eggs in has been shredded into tatters, sprinkled over the sticky white and yellow yoke of your beliefs. Your worldview lies shattered and broken at your feet, as if your higher self dropped the glass globe of your ego onto the unforgiving concrete of Truth. Your heart is broken, wide open, a crack so big the only thing that can fit into it is the entire universe. And so, it does.
Soul Awake:
“Suddenly you’re ripped into being alive. And life is pain, and life is suffering, and life is horror, but my god you’re alive and it’s spectacular.” ~Joseph Campbell
When the soul is awake, the ego takes a backseat. But the ego is on the edge of that backseat, because it is now finally able to experience astonishment and awe. It’s existentially taken aback. It is so transfixed by the inscrutable mystery of being an interconnected thing that it wonders in absolute befuddlement how it could not have noticed the poignant beauty of the interdependent cosmos in the time before. How could it not have foreseen that the soul was more powerful than the self? Then again, how can a caterpillar fathom the butterfly still to come?
With the soul awake comes a new flavor of pain. Your ego needs to figure out how to switch from being in charge to being a tool for the soul. This can be a painful process. The ego wants to be the one calling the shots, not playing second fiddle to the upstart soul, no matter how much healthier things are when its faculties are focused into soulcraft. Ego transformed into a tool for soulcraft is the ultimate art form. But this requires a lot of trial and error, much admittance to being wrong about a great many things, and truckloads of pride must be swallowed.
This is painful for the ego because it means that the past must be abandoned, that the Great Mystery can no longer be avoided, that the self-as-it-was cannot continue, and that nothing is ultimately permanent. When you know this in your bones, you live for the first time in your life. The cocoon of your rebirth is a broken shell lying at the edge of where the Matrix (self-deception) meets the Desert of the Real (self-awakening). And you know you must leave it behind, because now you are no longer limited by boundaries, you are liberated by horizons. You stand at the forefront of that liberation, declaring to the universe, “In order to awaken all things, I must attempt to awaken all of myself. The way of awakening may be unattainable, but I vow to attain it.”
Soulbreak:
“I overcame myself, the sufferer; I carried my own ashes to the mountains; I invented a brighter flame for myself. And behold, then this ghost fled from me.” ~Nietzsche
Just when your confidence is bolstered and your soul is flourishing into a state of Eudaimonia, the hard truth of the path sets in: true enlightenment is unattainable. Infinity is unreachable. Self-perfection is an illusion. The Fibonacci sequence can never achieve the sacred state of Phi. The Tao that can be named is never the true Tao. But there is sacred beauty in such painful truths: curiosity can never be quenched, there will always be questions, and the fact that everything changes means that nothing can ever be fixed. There is deep freedom in such musings. There is a deep soulbreath in the soulbreak.
As I wrote in Shadow of the Shaman:
“Soulbreak, like heartbreak, opens us up to the vast knowledge hidden within the nature of pain, but it also teaches us nonattachment. Soulbreak is detachment in the moment. If you are truly detached, your mental-spirit-body becomes a mighty tool for clear seeing. Authentic nonattachment becomes existential seeing.”
Existential seeing and present detachment are the cornerstones of having the wherewithal to walk the path. Without an agenda, free of conceit, and liberated from the boundaries of having a goal, present detachment is the wonderful side effect of having survived soulbreak. With it comes existential seeing, the ability to see the big picture, to feel the interconnectedness of all things weaving in and out of life and entropy. You see with over-eyes, like a cosmic owl with galaxies for pupils, perched on the branch of the universe, taking it all in.
Your heart, having broken, is a beautiful wound made all the more fecund by the painful process of initiation. Your soul, having cracked in half, is stronger than ever, breaking apart and coming back together again. Each time more robust. Each time more open to receiving the truth of impermanence.
The path to enlightenment is still a razor’s edge, but your feet are sharpening stones. You sharpen the universe and the universe sharpens you right back. You’ve cut through God so many times that infinity lost count. Vital cocoons behind you. Vast horizons ahead of you. The heart with which you perceive Love is the same heart with which Love perceives you, and the soul with which you envision Infinity is the same soul with which Infinity envisions you.
You’ve carried your hard-earned ashes to the mountain. Somewhere in the brighter flame of that summit is a Phoenix laughing at its own rebirth.
Image source:
I See from the Summit by Michael Camarra
About the Author:
Gary Z McGee, a former Navy Intelligence Specialist turned philosopher, is the author of Birthday Suit of God and The Looking Glass Man. His works are inspired by the great philosophers of the ages and his wide-awake view of the modern world.
War, on anything other than a localised dispute level, is a contrived and preplanned event based on ulterior motive.
In the era of globalisation, war is used to create a distraction from something of more lasting significance which the protagonists want to introduce under cover of the smoke and fire dominating imagery and rhetoric of the battle ground. Something that will further enslave a large body of humanity to conform to the desired end game – and at a much faster rate than would otherwise prove possible.
War is also motivated by the desirability of an economic upturn to the fortunes of the military industrial complex, and, of course, as a harbinger of chaos.
Chaos is a vital factor in inducing traumatised populations to call for a big brother saviour to end the conflict. The conflict that these same ‘saviour’ promoting elite control agents have had a major part in starting in the first place.
Given that world events are politically and economically manipulated to give ever greater power to ever fewer institutions and those who run them, ‘enemies of the people’ are easily identified.
However, the difference between a 21st century enemy and an enemy of previous eras, is that the 21st century version uses advanced psychological manipulation as the main weapon of an increasingly virtual armoury.
Therefore today’s public enemy no. 1 – is a master of deception.
Grasping this, means recognising that we have a new dimension to get to grips with in order to develop a strategy able to lay bare this deception and to explode its psychological hold over the better part of humanity.
This can only be done by those who possess the foresight and awareness which enables them to identify the behaviour patterns and motivations common to the chief operatives behind the process of human enslavement.
It includes recognising the main causal elements behind the mass hypnosis of humanity. The inducing of a state of mind (and being) which leads good people ‘not to act’ when everything around them instinctively demands taking immediate action.
On further scrutinising this dire state of affairs, it becomes apparent that there is something jamming the broader survival instinct of a great swathe of the human population.
By ‘survival state’ I mean more than somehow managing to stay alive in a crisis where one’s physical being is at risk. The state which is jammed is not this, it is at the psychic and spiritual level. That state which instinctively gives one a sense of what is right and what is wrong – and a connectedness with others as well as with the natural environment which nurtures us.
When this connected state is healthy, we instantly feel outraged that any part of this collective living entity of which we are a part, is under threat from the egregious acts of other human beings.
But when it is not healthy – when it is sick – this instinctual outrage fails to cut in. Instead, the predominant emotion is one of withdrawal and passive self preservation. And it is this retreat into a self interested cul-de-sac of indifference to the fate of the family of man and nature – which is the real pandemic of our time.
I have described in previous articles how the techno-industrial digitalised-god of mass abstraction, coupled to its promise of ‘a culture of convenience’, has played a large part in drawing mankind away from making any effort to connect to its deeper nature, to respond to the call of a higher goal and guiding soul.
A selfish preoccupation with personal preference is accompanied by an indulgence in essentially cosmetic concerns. And this comes at the very time when the world is being torn apart by pre planned and harshly enforced divisions that are vampiring human values and setting the stage for the central control system to become fully despotic.
Those able to afford the false luxury of selfish self interest at a time like this, brutally stand-out as prime examples of a complete breakdown of humanitarian and spiritual sensitivities which provide life with its true resonance and real meaning.
What we have to do in order to get somewhere in dealing with this all pervading crisis, is to pin-point the source and nature of this great deception being perpetrated on a largely non resistant mankind. Not just the technology – but that which stands behind the tech and which has hypnotised living beings into following its poisonous surveillance and control programme.
Here, once we look deeply enough, we find the anti-life agenda which belongs to that category of human sicknesses we know as psychotic, psychopathic and sadistic. Such a state of human demise holds that there is no God. That it is man who is in charge of the universe – or should be –
and that whatever forces exist ‘out there’, only those that help achieve the gross ambitions of earthlings are worth engaging with.
This is a cult persuasion. It is the predominant position held by the rump of world ‘leaders’ today. Their predominant state of being, no less. The younger ones have been trained by Klaus Schwab and his henchmen to be impenetrable and immune to human feelings. This is considered an imperative in the cause of the full techno-digital take over of daily life.
So our job is to understand this. Not to consign it to a box labelled ‘sickness of the 2%’ and put on the windowsill to be forgotten. It is up to us to acknowledge our part in accepting and allowing this cult siege of life on earth.
We, the people, are at least 90% of the problem. At each historical point, when conditions offered the chance to break the dark spell, we opted out. We failed to take action and take control of our destinies as fellow human beings who value truth, wisdom and justice above all else.
We instead allowed the red carpet to be rolled out for WEF ‘Young leaders’ and other psychotic power seekers to do their worst. Helped along by billionaire ego maniacs, corporate kings, queens and vulture bankers.
And if a brave group should rise up and block-off the centre of repressive power, as in Canada for example, then ‘we the people’s’ applause is fulsome. However, on an individual basis most say “Well done them!” but nevertheless revert to an impassive state of isolation, consigning the potentially life changing event to the same box on the window mantlepiece, while ruing the missed opportunity to rise-up as one and turn the tide of history.
It is undoubtedly the case that each of these ‘non-uprisings’ is a gift to our dark enslavers. Each clampdown which follows is more pervasive and more brutal than the last.
The subsequent fear, anxiety and confusion that comes with this, is the fuel which the cult needs to maintain its Satanic regime.
This is not idle talk. Those who worship at the alter of Baphomet pledge to ensure their monster master will be well fed. Masonic temples exist within the British House of Parliament. Wherever ambition involves trampling on others to achieve desired aims, demonic forces are involved.
Washington DC, Canberra (capital of Australia), and the Vatican in Rome are architecturally designed according to Satanic symbolism that embraces and worships money and power as the supreme goal of life. The City of London ‘square mile’ adopts this same obsession and no doubt Wall Street does too – and other such centres of unrestrained Mammon worship.
The deep state operatives could not achieve their global enforcement regime without a direct link to
centres of dark energy. Those most determined to be top dog will go to any lengths to achieve their ends.
This is why paedophilia and child sacrifice is resorted to within political and ‘elite’ circles whose calculated way of life is dependent on forever drawing upon the innocent power of others. Of vampiring the pure energy of innocent children and turning it into dark deeds of global repression.
So what is it that keeps mankind on its knees to those who freely indulge in continuous acts of murder?
Fear? Incredulity? Too much comfort? Cynical satisfaction with the ‘bargain slavery of the day’?
Something of each, no doubt. But more than all put together, it is my contention that the key is lack of self belief. And self belief does not mean ‘a big ego’, quite the opposite. It means knowing one is responding to that which offers guidance at the deepest level of one’s being.
Actions which come from this source are the only actions that will finally destroy the perpetrators of deep evil. There is no other answer to achieving the emancipation of mankind. There is no other force capable of deflating and defeating the Satanic vagabonds whose manifest life hating villainy spreads – almost unchecked – throughout a war torn world today.
Our true work, here and now, is to strengthen this bond we each have with our Creator and thereby to become properly prepared spiritual warriors, primed for confrontation with that which intends to destroy us and all trace of that Divine Spark which stirs our souls and makes us into real Human Beings.
Nurturing this spark to grow into a never dimming fire – this is our true challenge today. The call upon us all that will be the true catalyst to cast out the parasites and bring about the birth of a New Civilisation.
Courage, dear friends, courage. Victory is ours if we truly want it – and are ready to fight for it.
Julian Rose is an early pioneer of UK organic farmer, a writer, broadcaster and international activist. He is author of three books, the most recent of which is ‘Overcoming the Robotic Mind’. Go to his website for further information www.julianrose.info
Overcoming the Robotic Mind – Why Humanity Must Come Through
By Eve Cable, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter
The Kahnawake Cannabis Control Board (KCCB) is once again looking for community representatives after the resignation of Rhonda Kirby earlier this month.
The KCCB is now made up of its remaining members, David Diabo and Tara Jacobs. Though there are fewer than the desired three members sitting, two is enough to reach quorum, and therefore enough to continue moving forward with the cannabis file.
“They’re able to hold meetings. They are functioning,” Perron said. “It’s just that, in the event that anything comes up in terms of something ever being a conflict of interest for any board member for some reason, you definitely want to have at least three, so there can still be two others. So we’re going to fill that position as fast as we can,” said Mohawk Council of Kahnawake (MCK) chief Tonya Perron, who has led the cannabis file since its inception.
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The open seat on the board was posted publicly at the same time as Kirby’s resignation was announced. To be eligible, Kahnawa’kehro:non must be at least 21, must have no criminal conviction for an indictable offence or must have received a full pardon for any such conviction, must not have an interest in a private entity that has applied for or been granted a cannabis-related licence, and must not have a family member who has an interest in a private entity that has applied for or been granted a cannabis-related licence.
“It’s to ensure the credibility of the board in the decisions that they make, so they can’t be undermined,” Perron said. “There’s only a limited amount of permits that will be issued in terms of dispensaries, so we really want to ensure that there is no perception of bias or actual bias.”
There is no deadline for applications for the seat, and Perron said she hopes it is filled sooner rather than later. She said once applications come in, an informal interview will be conducted with Suzanne Jackson, the MCK’s legal counsel, and Perron herself.
Applicants can send letters of intent to join the board to Dwaine White, general manager of the office of the Council of chiefs.
Kirby had joined the board in May of this year. According to Perron, her resignation was voluntary. “There’s always dialogue that goes on between board members,” Perron said. “There was conversation about various things, and she submitted her letter of resignation.”
Kirby declined to comment, saying she was out of town for work and cited limited network service.
The journey of a cannabis product from soil to consumption can be a tortuous one. Given that many cultivators and processors are feeling squeezed financially, it is no surprise that conflicts arise.
One of the most common areas of dispute is between a cultivator and a processor or a large LP with distribution. It usually takes a cultivator of any size over two months from germination to harvest, and upon harvest, most companies can’t afford to sit around: they want their biomass put to good use.
Here is where partnering with a well-connected processor – or perhaps a big LP – can save the day, as these companies often have the capabilities, the branding, and the market access. Unfortunately, once that biomass is out the door, getting payment can be a roll of the dice.
“We started out as an indoor cultivator with a 20-year contract in place to grow for a large Albertan LP,” says Carleen Roth, who, with her husband Marlin, operates CannGroup Dev. Corp. in Vernon, BC. “Before we even sold them our first crop, they were having financial troubles, and within the year they cancelled the contract.”
CannGroup then pivoted to extraction and CBD isolate production, and brought a legacy brand into their facility.
“Last year, we were selling that product through another LP to the provinces, as we couldn’t get our product accepted by those provincial boards,” says Roth. “That LP got our products accepted, and sold our products through to the provinces. They got paid for those products from the provinces and then stopped making their payments to us for the product sales, kept our funds, and went into CCAA protection in the fall of 2022.”
Roth estimates that CannGroup has lost about $1.2 million for the cost of producing those goods. Incredibly, they are also on the hook for $400,000 in excise tax.“The CRA holds us solely responsible as the excise stamps came from our licence; however, they’re working with us and have allowed us a payment plan,” says Roth. “Our guess is that they realize that there are so many companies in the same trouble, that if they bankrupt us all, they will get nothing unless they work with LPs.”
The limits of due diligence
StratCann spoke with numerous micros, LPs, and processors for this article – most of whom were unwilling to go on the record, either because of possible legal repercussions or the negative effect on their brand.
Two messages, however, come through loud and clear: many companies are hurting financially, which is leading to some questionable behaviour, and due diligence is a must, though there is no guarantee that this will ensure ethical behaviour.
“Contract agreements with processors are necessary,” says Vincent Bédard, director of Green Culture Verte, a micro in Fournier, Ontario. “However, our contract often says payment within 30 days, and we’ll get it in one and a half or two months. At that point, the contract’s been broken, but we have to accept it.”
Minor anomalies in such arrangements can be absorbed. Sadly, in more serious breaches, there’s little recourse.
“I am aware of micros sending many kilos of flower to a processor, and the processor paying for half of what was sent over, with the micro then left waiting for payment on the other half,” says Bédard. “The entire lot is sold, but that remaining half isn’t remitted. At that point, a large processor can say, ‘Take us to court!’ and just drag it out.”
Often, disputes arise among two parties that have had a good working relationship, with the trust resulting in more flexibility. This is understandable – but as terms become increasingly generous, they can also lead to dire consequences.
“We were told the company had good earnings, a great sales team and a strong parent company,” says Roth from CannGroup. “We signed the contract. They started out okay, but after two months, they started paying only partially and told us that they were raising money from their parent company to get us caught up.”
Roth says that the company dragged this out for another two and a half months, telling CannGroup that they would pay the next week, and giving partial payments.
“We had to make the decision to stop sending product,” she says. “They continued to collect the funds from our product being sold for the following two months and then went into CCAA.”
Quality pays
For smaller cultivators, one solution might be the approach followed by Ontario Micro Growers (OMG), which doesn’t charge its micro partners any fees, and pays them for their product upfront rather than on consignment.
“OMG’s approach isn’t typical,” says Craig Penstone, a co-founder of OMG. “It benefits growers by sharing their risk and increasing trust. Small growers face challenges like competition, regulation, distribution, and branding, but financing it all is probably the heaviest.”
What is understood in this arrangement is that the biomass will be of a marketable quality. While some disputes are due to financial constraints, others can come from a disagreement over the value of the cannabis itself, as can be seen in the recent dispute between Okanna Craft and Joint Venture Craft Cannabis (JVCC).
It is also important to note that once a processor takes possession of any biomass, it automatically assumes chain of custody – no matter the financial arrangement or the status of COAs. If the processor is dishonest or simply negligent, then all bets are off.
“I know of horror stories where micros pay processor fees, and then the processors just leave them in the dark,” says Bedárd from Green Culture Verte.
In one example shared on background with StratCann, a cultivator sent a processor a large amount of biomass with no agreement in place. The processor deemed the product unusable and destroyed it with no notice or remuneration. There is now an active dispute about how much money is owed – if any.
“If you’re a farmer, you know that your product is based on quality, but many people in this industry aren’t willing to accept lower prices that come with lower quality,” says Bedárd from Green Culture Verte. “I am currently dealing with another processor, as I am working on bringing a quality product to market. It is going very well – I’m hoping the processor can place the product with larger brands.”
Lessons learned
From the examples researched for this article – as well as some that were left out due to an unwillingness of some companies to go on the record – the lessons learned are clear:
Get a written agreement. A typical grower relationship with a traditional processor/marketer involves fees, consignment, IP rights, and exclusivity deals. None of this is worth much unless it is supported by a written contract. No product should be sent or received without a contract. Be sure to loop in your Quality Assurance Person (QAP).
Follow the COA regulations. Health Canada regulations are clear: a processor cannot accept any cannabis material without contaminant testing. Some companies are conducting business (sending, receiving and washing cannabis, etc.) without a Certificate of Analysis (COA). This is a major warning sign that puts all parties at risk.
Start small. There may be a temptation for cultivators to unload large amounts of biomass on processors, but StratCann has heard of many accounts where profit-sharing agreements are not honoured, or micros are simply ghosted.
Look for the signs. Small payment delays or anomalies can be excused, but repeated lack of payment is a huge warning flag, no matter the size and reputation of the company.
Trust yourself. If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is. Overly-generous revenue sharing agreements, and sweet delivery or payment terms, may be a red flag.
Prepare for hardball. Many smaller companies are getting burned because they are simply unwilling to go to court. Though it is certainly a last resort, court action must be accepted as a possibility.
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