Although Lesotho legalized cannabis exports in 2018, Africa has been a slow starter in joining the ranks of those countries pushing for reform and regulated markets. Although fewer than a quarter of the continent’s countries have partially legalized cannabis, primarily medical cannabis for export and industrial hemp, Africa has the potential to be a future powerhouse on the international cannabis stage. Stay in the loop with all the news, policy, legislative, regulatory and market developments with Cannabiz Africa, your reliable content guide to the African cannabis environment.
Malawi’s leading cannabis company, Invegrow, is building its own offices out of hempcrete. This is part of the company’s drive to find low cost hemp solutions for housing under the theme: Building Differently, Building for Africa’.
A dedicated focus on industrial hemp could be transformative for Africa, but only 12 of the continent’s 54 countries have grasped its potential. Africa editor John Makoni writes that the plant is there, ready and waiting, he wonders why policy-makers are so slow to come to the party.
Lesotho’s cannabis revival has been given a huge boost with independent EU-GMPCertification awarded to MG Health and LuCan Labs late last year. MG Health founder Andre Bothma, says the recognition is a major step forward in the company’s global cannabis strategy that will benefit the country as a whole.
The Cannabis Association of Botswana is embarking on the lawfare route to force Government to recognize that civil society has a place in the development of a local cannabis economy. CAB has been waiting for a year to be registration and has decided to go to court to force the authorities to come clean on the delay.
Zimbabwe’s renowned hemp activist Dr Zoey Maroveke (pictured here) is finally seeing the fruits of her labour as Zimbabwe launches its first major commercial hemp trial at Mvurwi. The showcase project will pull together years of ZIHT research and experimentation.
Botswana president Duma Boko (pictured here) has acted quickly and decisively in establishing Botswana as Africa’s newest cannabis player. However, there is growing disquiet as to who the main beneficiaries of the new cannabis economy will be, as highlted in a recent editorial in the Sunday Standard.
Botswana has deliberately designed its cannabis licensing regime to favour multinationals with deep pockets rather than empower local farmers, who will remain trapped at the bottom of the value chain. It has also raised barriers to entry by making its industry one of the most tightly regulated in the world.
Cannabis Expo CEO Silas Howarth says the cannabis industry has gained significant momentum in the past 12 months. He says that last year’s frustration and uncertainty has given way to a new optimism now that government is actively tackling the regulatory bottlenecks to growth.
A senior Zambian regulator has offered to engage with his Ghanaian counterparts on adapting the West African country’s existing cannabis regulations to make the hemp sector more accessible to local farmers. Dr Prosper Sievu made the offer on a Cheeba Africa webinar in response to a plea from Ghana’s hemp sector for pan-African support.
The development of a viable industrial hemp industry in Southern Africa depends on closing critical gaps in funding, coordination, and implementation, experts said at the recent African Industrial Hemp Fibre Processing for Commercialisation Conference in Durban, KwaZulu-Natal.
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