Minutes before 10 a.m. on a cold, wet Sunday a year ago in Ann Arbor, marijuana rights pioneer and poet John Sinclair made the first official purchase of recreational marijuana, a handful of pre-rolled joints for $160.35.
It was a happy day for him and many Michiganders who’ve long been eager for marijuana to become mainstream, and not just for medical use.
Since that day, the fledgling adult-use industry has accounted for nearly a half-billion dollars in sales, and based on the most recent figures that show weekly sales near or exceeding $13 million, the industry is closing on projected annual sales in excess of $1 billion over the next year.
“The MRA successfully implemented the regulatory program for commercial adult-use marijuana leading to benefits for the industry, consumers and the citizens of the state,” Marijuana Regulatory Agency Director Andrew Brisbo said. “Over 450 licenses have been issued leading to over $450 million in sales, generating nearly $74 million in tax revenue.
“As the MRA continues its focus on equity, diversity, and inclusion, the next year will continue to provide opportunities for many businesses in the state to offer the safest possible access to marijuana for consumers.”
Business owners are overwhelmingly happy to be part of the thriving market, despite the volatility that has marked the first year of operation. As if launching an entirely new regulated industry wasn’t complicated enough, businesses were forced to deal with lockdowns and business limitations resulting from the coronavirus pandemic.
“As our state was hit with COVID-19 our members pivoted to curbside and delivery, developed safety and sanitation procedures and the (Marijuana Regulatory Agency) did an incredible job ensuring our facilities had all of the resources they needed to operate safely,” said Robin Schneider, director of the Michigan Cannabis Industry Association, a trade organization with more than 200 marijuana business members. “Many more municipalities including Detroit (have opted into the recreational market) and we’ve created good paying jobs across the state.
“Our members have really stepped up and made incredible contributions to families who are experiencing poverty this year through food drives, supporting local charities and several (personal protective equipment) contributions.”
Schneider called an “incredible year” for the industry, despite the numerous obstacles.
Here are some highlights and milestones from the recreational marijuana industry’s first year in existence.
Original licensing board abolished, March of 2019:
Arguably the biggest event to shape the state’s marijuana industry came with Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s decision to abolish the Medical Marihuana Licensing Board. It was a state-appointed, voting board created by Gov. Rick Snyder’s administration and criticized for being slow and bogged down by politics.
Licensing powers were shifted to the newly formed Marijuana Regulatory Agency, an arm of Licensing and Regulatory Affairs (LARA), which now helps set industry rules and approves new business licenses.
Michigan Marijuana Regulatory Agency Director Andrew Brisbo, shakes hands with co-owner of Exclusive Brands, Omar Hishmeh standing next to Narmin Jarrous, executive vice president of business development and director of social equity program as they receive the first recreational marijuana license in the state of Michigan during a Marijuana Regulatory Agency press briefing on Tuesday Nov. 19, 2019 at 3820 Varsity Drive. Nicole Hester/Mlive.com
Application window opens Nov. 1, 2019:
Surprising some who expected the industry launch to take longer, the Marijuana Regulatory Agency announced it would begin accepting new business applications online shortly after midnight on Nov. 1.
Marijuana Regulatory Agency Director Andrew Brisbo said the nearly 35 applications received by 5 p.m. on the first day “slightly” exceeded expectations.
A lack of clarity from local municipal governments on whether they’ll allow recreational marijuana businesses likely caused some prospective businesses to delay their applications, Brisbo said at the time.
Brisbo said the first businesses would start operations on Sunday, Dec. 1, 2019.
First recreational marijuana sales, Dec. 1, 2019:
The excitement for recreational marijuana translated to blocks-long lines and hours-long waits as eager customers arrived at the first four stores to publicly open, three of which are located in Ann Arbor and a fourth in Morenci.
The demand for legal, recreational marijuana was so high that numerous out-of-state customers drove to Michigan, mostly from Indiana and Ohio, to participate in the historic day.
People wait in line to purchase recreational marijuana at Exclusive Brands in Ann Arbor on Sunday, Dec. 1, 2019. Mary Lewandowski| MLive.com
“Window shopping” inside retail stores filled with the pungent aroma of marijuana and fluffy, multi-colored buds, it turns out, is not necessary for healthy marijuana sales.
Shortly after Whitmer on March 23 issued her first stay-at-home order in an effort to curb spread of the coronavirus, she announced marijuana businesses would be included among the party stores and grocers allowed to continue operating.
However, things would be a little different. Retail spaces were closed to the public, but curbside sales were approved and requests for delivery permissions expedited. This meant more online shopping and less in-person perusing, but it led to only a short-lived dip in sales.
A KKind employee weighs out marijuana flower at a new recreational marijuana provisioning center in Kalamazoo Township, Michigan on Friday, March 13, 2020. Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Wolf and Lt. Gov. John Fetterman on Sept. 3, 2020, called on the Republican-controlled Legislature to expedite the legalization of recreational marijuana, for both economic and social benefits. GOP leaders pushed back on the idea.Joel Bissell file photo | For MLive.com
Recreational sales in July surpassed medical marijuana sales for the first time since the adult-use market opened, a feat that Brisbo said he didn’t expect to come so quickly.
Recreational sales continue to soar and widen that revenue gap. For the month of September, recreational revenue accounted for about $13 million more than medical sales.
Michigan Native America tribe enters marijuana industry:
Bay Mills Indian Community, which is comprised of about 2,200 Native Americans from the Ojibwe tribe based in Brimley, where it also operates the Bay Mills Resort and Casinos, opened its own marijuana retail store on Nov. 6.
It also plans to break ground on a 10,000-plant indoor grow facility south of Sault Ste. Marie as early as January of next year, Bay Mills Indian Communities Board Chair Bryan T. Newland said.
Since Native Americans are autonomous and operate under their own governance, the store and grow operation are not regulated by the Michigan Regulatory Agency or the state’s 6% sales and 10% excise tax. That translates to “much lower prices,” the tribe said in a release announcing the grand opening.
Bay Mills Indian Community grow facility near Sault Ste. Marie
More than 500,000 plants licensed in state:
By July, Michigan marijuana growers, both medical and recreational, were licensed to grow over 500,000 plants. Based on a low-end estimate of a quarter pound harvested per plant with three grow cycles per year, that equates to a potential annual production of approaching 400,000 pounds of usable marijuana.
If that was sold for an average of $410 per ounce, the average retail price for recreational marijuana in May, the possible harvest would generate nearly $2.6 billion in total sales.
A vitamin E acetate sample is displayed Monday, Nov. 4, 2019, during a tour of the Medical Marijuana Laboratory of Organic and Analytical Chemistry at the Wadsworth Center in Albany, New York. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta said Friday, Nov. 8, 2019, fluid extracted from 29 lung injury patients who vaped contained the chemical compound in all of them.AP Photo/Hans Pennink
A national crisis surrounding the use of vitamin E acetate, which wasn’t previously thought to be harmful, in THC-infused vaping cartridges resulted in 68 deaths and 2,807 hospitalizations by February of this year.
It proved to be one of the first major regulatory tests faced by the Marijuana Regulatory Agency, which had to quickly adapt testing and sourcing rules to ensure tainted vaping cartridges didn’t reach the general public.
Those rules included a ban on the ingredient and led to shortage of vaping cartridges across the state. They were nearly nonexistent for recreational purchase when the adult-use market first opened.
Some of the contaminated products, which were manufactured prior to the Marijuana Regulatory Agency tightening rules, were still being recalled from business inventories as recently as September.
Photo of double rainbow near MaryLynn Bigelow's failed hemp farm in Michigan's northern Lower Peninsula. Photo courtesy of Marylynn Bigelow
Hemp:
An offshoot of marijuana legalization is acceptance and return of hemp farming to Michigan. The state launched a pilot program in 2019 that continued through the 2020 growing season.
There were 631 growers and 517 processor-handlers that registered or received licenses to grow this year, according to the state Department of Agriculture and Rural Development.
Hemp production focuses on applications of the cannabis plant for uses unrelated to its THC content, such as the production of building materials or CBD, an extract that won’t get a person high but is believed to have medicinal and therapeutic uses. Hemp, based on the government’s definition, contains less than 0.3% THC.
Michigan issued the first microbusiness license to Sticky Bush Farms owned by Benjamin Kolasa in Presque Isle County’s Onaway in late September.
He’s a former caregiver who’s taking what he’s learned to the recreational marijuana realm. He plans to open his 500-square-foot shop by spring.
The microbusiness is a unique license type that allows a small-scale owner to grow up to 150 plants, manufacture and sell their own products from their own storefront. A microbusiness can’t, however, intermingle with other licensees, as far as selling their product, for instance, to a retail store, or by purchasing harvest flower or product from a grower or processor.
Fred Delfino, a law enforcement liaison with Abbott Toxicology, exhibits the saliva collection device being used by Michigan police to conduct roadside tests for drugged driving. (Photo by Emily Lawler)
Before Michigan voters passed recreational marijuana legalization in 2018, legislators and police were already growing concerned about the risks of driving while high. This led state police to launch a roadside saliva drug testing program that ran through November 2018.
The program, after revealing some inconsistencies with testing machines, was extended in 2018 and concluded Sept. 18 with a findings report expected to be released this January.
The second yearlong pilot was expected to cost nearly $626,000 and included 125 officers dubbed “drug recognition experts,” who were specially trained to detect drug impairment and administer saliva tests.
For the first two years of the recreational market’s existence, its expansion was expected to be limited by a prerequisite that said any recreationally licensed business must first hold a medical marijuana business license.
Because only a limited number of communities, about 250 of 1,773 cities, townships and villages in the state, opted into the medical marijuana market, the possibilities were limited. The Marijuana Regulatory Agency in October announced they would be doing away with the prerequisite beginning in March of 2020.
Sara Loosier trims medical marijuana from a bay inside a fenced in grow at the Loosier home in Kalamazoo County, Michigan on Friday, Oct. 5, 2018. Sara is the caregiver and the only person that is allowed inside the fenced in grow area. Joel Bissell | MLive.com Joel Bissell | MLive.comJoel Bissell | MLive.com
For supply reasons, the licensed medical and recreational marijuana markets initially relied on marijuana grown, sold, and at one time processed by independent caregivers.
“The Marijuana Regulatory Agency’s goal is to stimulate business growth while protecting patient safety,” the agency said in March. “To support that goal, the (Marijuana Regulatory Agency) will implement a phase-out process for the transfer of marijuana and marijuana products into the regulated market from caregivers.”
Caregivers were entirely phased out of the commercial markets on Oct. 1, meaning all marijuana products now originated only from plants grown by licensed businesses.
Inside Utopia Gardens, a medical marijuana dispensary on Detroit's near east side, Sept. 12, 2018. (Tanya Moutzalias | MLive.com) Tanya Moutzalias | MLive.comTanya Moutzalias | MLive.com
A point of contention surrounded some proposed marijuana regulatory rules that were later implemented, including a requirement that licensees sign “labor peace agreements” with labor unions before being issued a licenses. While some viewed this as a move to unionize the industry, Brisbo said it was intended to ensure there were no market disruptions due to labor disputes.
The requirement was ultimately discarded when the final rules were signed into law.
To the dismay of some, including Marijuana Regulatory Agency Director Brisbo, the vast majority of Michigan cities, townships and villages have opted not to participate in the recreational marijuana industry, but that is slowly changing.
When sales first went live, more than 1,400 Michigan communities had banned recreational marijuana businesses. The number of opt-outs remains above 1,300, but some of the state’s larges cities, including Detroit and Grand Rapids, have since entered the fray.
In other communities, like the Detroit-encircled suburb of Hamtramck, recreational business was never banned nor given the green light, which has led to some confusion. A marijuana store opened in the city without the public’s prior knowledge, leading some residents to call for a formal ban after the fact.
In other cities, like Whitmore Lake, residents passed ballot initiatives to fend off would-be municipal bans on the industry.
Detroit delayed authorizing recreational business until it had a framework to ensure local residents would benefit. The current ordinance now requires half of the licenses or more to go to “legacy” residents, who’ve lived in the city for at least a year.
More cannabis industry news on MLive:
Marijuana drinks could be coming to Michigan
Michigan stands to gain more than $1B as recreational marijuana shops open
Medical marijuana blazed a trail for cannabis in Michigan. Now, recreational takes the lead.
Michigan marijuana industry changed, but thriving amid coronavirus pandemic
"industry" - Google News
December 02, 2020 at 10:33PM
https://ift.tt/3fYE58W
Michigan’s recreational marijuana industry celebrates birthday after ‘incredible’ first year - MLive.com
"industry" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2RrQtUH
https://ift.tt/2zJ3SAW
Bagikan Berita Ini
0 Response to "Michigan’s recreational marijuana industry celebrates birthday after ‘incredible’ first year - MLive.com"
Post a Comment