Stakeholders have until 5 March 2025 to submit their input on the regulations that will govern the Cannabis for Private Purposes Act 2024.
Among the issues already highlighted are regulations involving the transport of cannabis and the acceptable limits of home grow and possession.
How can possession be legal when dealing isn’t?
One of the most glaring problems, however, is the Act specifically criminalizes commercial cannabis transactions, which begs the obvious question: how are the country’s estimated 2,5 million cannabis users supposed to exercise their constitutional right without having to grow their own.
There is also no provision for legacy growers who are intended to be the main beneficiaries of cannabis reform.
Albertus van Jaarsveldt, spokesperson for the South African Cannabis Club Alliance believes the private club model provides a solution to the conundrum of accommodating legacy growers and ‘non-commercial’ consumption.
“The purpose of the Cannabis for Private Purposes Act is not merely to decriminalise conduct, but to give meaningful effect to constitutionally protected rights. For these rights to be realised in practice, the regulatory framework must accommodate reasonable and lawful mechanisms for access and private association” he says.
What should be in the regulations
Van Jaarsveldt says that, accordingly, the Regulations should:
- recognise non-commercial cannabis clubs or private associations as a lawful form of private association;
- clarify that collective cultivation and distribution among members for private purposes, absent profit or commercial intent, does not constitute dealing; and
- provide minimum regulatory principles to ensure transparency, non-profit operation, and compliance with prescribed limits.
He tells Cannabiz Africa that an explicit provision for non-commercial cannabis clubs would strengthen the regulations, promote legal certainty, and better align the regulatory framework with constitutional principles.
Fields of Green for All executive director Myrtle Clarke says “there are certainly a lot of worrying things about the Act that don’t make sense at all”. She says enforcement will be almost impossible (“who’s going to count our plants”) and that limits appear arbitrary.
She says FGFA will be making a submission, but will be adopting a ‘wait and see’ approach until the final regulations are published. “There’s no legal action being considered at the moment, but we’ll see how this all pans out”.
Hope behind closed doors
There are encouraging noises coming out of the informal discussions that have been taking place between the Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (DTIC). Cannabiz Africa understands that at a ‘dialogue’ last week between the Marijuana Board of South Africa (MBOSA) and DTIC officials, the private club model (both commercial and non-commercial) was acknowledged as worthy of inclusion in new regulations. There was even talk of the DTIC being prepared to issue a ‘certificate of compliance’ cannabis clubs that met minumum standards.
MBOSA, SACCA and the South African Cannabis and Hemp Industrial Development Association (SACHIDA) have all backed the Project Indlela campaign to recognize the legitimacy of private clubs and legacy communities.
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