Global Ganja Report

After what has been an agonizing delay for many patients, Louisiana's first medical marijuana harvest has just cleared inspection. But there are still more hurdles before the first extracts and tinctures will begin arriving in the state's nine approved pharmacies. 

With cannabis now legal in 10 US states as well as Canada, demands are growing to wipe out past convictions for personal possession. Politicians have started to respond—but not fast enough for some advocates.

Last month, the DEA enthused the pharmaceutical industry but disappointed cannabis advocates by re-scheduling the drug Epidiolex—but not CBD, the cannabinoid that makes it work. Now word emerges of a letter to the DEA by the Food & Drug Administration essentially calling for the descheduling of CBD altogether.

Hemp Business Journal reports that products infused with CBD oil are leading growth in hermp-derived products sold in the United States generally, which in 2016 had a collective retail value of $688 million. This figure represents a five year 22% compound annual growth rate (CAGR). Joining more traditional products such as shelled seed, protein powder, soaps and lotions, are growing lines of medicinal preparations such as CBD edibles. Hemp-derived cannabidiol (CBD) accounted for $130 million in sales last year.

High Times magazine's Las Vegas Cannabis Cup, scheduled to open March 4 on Moapa Pauite tribal land outside the Sin City, has been threatened by the federal Justice Department. A letter to tribal authorities warning against the event comes as the Trump administration is making noises about a more intolerant approach to the cannabis economy. Cup organizers now say no actual cannabis will be allowed at the confab, local KTNV reports. But the event itself is still on—a trade show, capped by a concert headlining rapper Ludcaris to celebrate the passage of Question 2, Nevada's legalization initiative.

The results of the Nov. 8 elections really indicate the schizophrenic nature of American political culture at this moment. Amid the fear and loathing over the election of the fascistic Donald Trump as president, big gains were registered for cannabis freedom. Voters in California approved Proposition 64, legalizing  up to an ounce for those 21 and older, and allowing individuals to grow up to six plants. The measure also permits retail sales and imposes a 15% tax. Similar measures passed in Massachusetts, Maine and Nevada, bringing the percentage of Americans living in states where cannabis is legal for adults up from five to 20 percent. Only Arizona's Proposition 205 was rejected by the voters.

Businessman Zhenli Ye Gon, accused of producing and trafficking methamphetamine, was extradited to Mexico Oct. 18. Placed by US Marshals on a flight from Virginia to Mexico City, he was upon his arrival immediately taken to the country's top-security lock-up, the notorious Altiplano Prison. The turn-over comes after he lost a nine-year legal battle against extradition from the US, BBC reports. Zhenli Ye Gon fled to the United States in 2007 after Mexican police seized $205 million in cash from his Mexico City villa. As South China Morning Post notes, this was hailed as the biggest cash haul in the history of global drug enforcement. Authorities say he was importing vast quantities of precursor chemicals for meth production. Ye Gon, who has dual Chinese and Mexican citizenship, denies the charges, maintaining that his company, Unimed Pharm Chem Mexico, was producing legal prescription drugs.

Multiple court cases in Nevada are prompting a second look at the state's medical marijuana law. In a sometimes heated courtroom session, Clark County District Judge Douglas Smith heard arguments Sept. 16 in the case of six defendants arrested last November in a raid of Jolly Green Meds co-op on Las Vegas' famed Sahara Ave. On Sept. 12, the county's Judge Donald Mosley threw out a grand jury indictment in a case concerning the Sin City Co-Op, also of Las Vegas, and also shut down in a raid. Mosley ruled that the grand jury wasn't shown enough evidence to indicate that an undercover officer illegally obtained cannabis at the co-op. (Las Vegas Sun, Sept. 16)