Based on my experience as a member of the Cannabis Organisation University of Pretoria and a member of one of the working groups set up to give inputs for a government masterplan first drawn up in 2021, I make four recommendations to fast-track the process. However, some farmers in the rural areas of the Eastern Cape are still waiting.īut there is a way forward. The second is that, from mid-2022, small-scale farmers farming cannabis were promised that they would be issued with licences to farm legally. The potential legal pharmaceutical market for hemp and cannabis in South Africa alone has been estimated at over R100bn a year. The opportunity to commercialise the hemp and cannabis industry is that it is a new, fast-growing, multi-billion dollar sector with local and international markets. One estimate is that the sector has the potential to create more than 130,000 new jobs. The industry has the potential to create jobs, alleviate poverty and help reduce the extreme inequality in South Africa. The commercialisation will allow them to farm outdoors on a larger scale. The Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development and the Department of Health are working closely to address the existing conditions for growing hemp and cannabis to enable outdoor cultivation and harvesting by rural farmers.Ĭurrently farmers who have licences, grow their hemp and cannabis indoors under controlled conditions. In his speech, the president indicated that government is in the process of addressing the conditions for the growth of the cannabis sector, particularly for rural farmers.
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