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Leading global industry players HempConsult GmbH and Hempro International GmbH & Co. KG, both of Germany, have signed on as sponsors of the inaugural Asian Hemp Summit set next Feb. 1-2 in Kathmandu, Nepal. HempToday, Shah Hemp Inno-Ventures (SHIV) and Hempoint, Czech Republic, are organizers of the Summit.

“We’re happy to see this initiative and keen to support it,” said Daniel Kruse, CEO, whose companies have been active on the Asian continent for more than 15 years. “There’s never been a more exciting moment than now in Asia, as the pieces come together that can shape the region into the world’s leading hemp producer,” said Kruse, who will address the Summit.

Speaker slots still available

The Summit, to be held at Gokarna Forest Resort in Kathmandu, already has a roster of 14 international presenters. Applications are still being taken to fill the few remaining places on the schedule, organizers said.

“These sponsor partnerships reflect a continuing commitment to hemp across the continent on the part of Hempro Int. and HempConsult,” said Dhiraj K. Shah, CEO at Kathmandu-based SHIV. In addition to their long-term involvement in Asia, the two German companies recently supported SHIV’s work creating shelter for displaced, disadvantaged Nepalese who lost their homes after the 2014 earthquake in the country. Hempro Int. and HempConsult purchased a house for a family that was constructed by SHIV of hempcrete.

The Founder of the Her Many Voices Foundation (HMVF), Alicia Fall is a TEDx Talk presenter (The Art of Igniting Action), educator, performing artist and public speaker on humanitarian issues for more than 30 years. Fall’s Foundation spearheads a pioneering hemp project that is developing a sustainable crop and building product for Haiti’s besieged yet resilient population.

HempToday: How would you describe things in Haiti at the moment, post the hurricanes of 2016 and the 2010 quake?
Alicia Fall: I get updates almost daily from our Projects Coordinator in Haiti. What I can say is the people continue to have an indomitable spirit of hope in the face of natural and unnatural disasters. That’s the positive. The reality is that since the quake and post 2016’s three hurricanes, there’s an unrest in the streets. People are frustrated and rightfully so. They’re sick of lip service given to them on promises of life improvements: Promises of work, promises of food security, medical attention and education for their children.

University students are tired of repeatedly having doors locked because of violent protests in the streets. They’ve been promised a lot, yet in 8 years little has changed for the majority of Haitians. One disaster after another and like in most countries, political divisiveness, have taken their toll on a very strong and resilient people.

What we have personally experienced is more tension in the air, more violence in the streets, more gang activity. When people become desperate the climate changes. And desperate actions are taken when the feeling is no action is taken by authorities to improve their circumstance. At the end of the day women still need to feed their children, men still need work and people still need more than hope. They need practical responses. That’s where Her Many Voices Foundation comes in. We provide practical education for women, children and men in Haiti in the belief that it will improve, at least, their individual worlds. Then they can pass that knowledge on to the next. It takes a collective effort to make big change. We are excited to be leading the way to a more sustainable future through our hemp project.

HT: What’s the role of hemp in meeting the goals of the Her Many Voices Foundation?
AF: HMVF is founded on a profound respect for importance of Mother Earth. Like most mothers she gives us everything we need and asks little in return. Our mission is to move our passions to purpose for the betterment of women, children and our Mother Earth.

While hemp and marijuana may be close relatives, most hemp-derived CBD retailers don’t sell the products alongside medical cannabis. But as state laws around cannabidiol continue to change, stand-alone CBD stores may become a relic of the past. According to estimates from Hemp Industry Daily in the 2018 Hemp & CBD Industry Factbook, CBD sales in the U.S. […]

Chart: The days of CBD-only stores may be numbered is a post from: Marijuana Business Daily: Financial, Legal & Cannabusiness news for cannabis entrepreneurs

Canadian Industrial Hemp Corporation (CIHC) has been awarded a CA$100,000 (US$ 77,000) grant from the Canadian Agricultural Partnership (CAP) to advance development and commercialization of a system that will predict the engineering properties of custom bio-pellet formulations.

The artificial intelligence (AI) system is designed to allow thermoplastic producers to easily identify bio-pellet formulations which are structurally and aesthetically suitable to replace their existing 100% polymer feedstock, said CIHC Founder & CEO Robert Ziner.

CAP and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) work with provincial and territorial governments in establishing policy and program priorities for the development of Canada’s farming value chain.

Potential boon for farmers

“We are grateful for this opportunity to advance the utilization of hemp fiber and encourage the growth of more hemp across Canada,” Ziner said of the grant. “With our innovative business model in place, growing hemp will prove to be one of the most attractive economic crop opportunities for farmers across North America.”

Toronto-based CIHC is looking to raise CA$46 million (US$ 35 million) in the USA to build a fully operational AI driven, advanced hemp stalk processing and optimization system.

The world’s largest retailer, Walmart, is considering selling CBD products in Canada, a development that comes just days before the country’s recreational marijuana markets open. But Walmart says it isn’t ready to start selling cannabidiol just yet. “As we would for any new industry, Walmart Canada has done some preliminary fact-finding on this issue,” company […]

Walmart explores selling CBD in Canada is a post from: Marijuana Business Daily: Financial, Legal & Cannabusiness news for cannabis entrepreneurs

Weekly Deal Watch: Cannabis investor demand shifts from Canada to US is a post from: Marijuana Business Daily: Financial, Legal & Cannabusiness news for cannabis entrepreneurs

Poland’s government-owned petroleum firm Grupa Lotos said it has entered an agreement with the state-owned Institute of Natural Fibers and Medicinal Plants (IWNiRZ) to produce bio-ethanol from hemp.

“We have the opportunity to produce second generation fuels from Polish waste plants,” said Małgorzata Zimniewska of the Institute. “The development of bioethanol, higher-generation biofuels from cannabis biomass is in the interest of both the Institute and Poland,” she said. But above all it is in the interest of Polish farmers, who are quickly taking to hemp farming as fields rapidly expand, she added.

The parties said the effort, in part, is a response to European Union directives regarding renewable energy sources.

The Lotos-IWNiRZ agreement comes after Robert Sobków, who served as director of IWNiRZ for the past year, recently moved over to become vice-president for financial affairs at Lotos, one of the ten largest fuel companies in Central Europe by sales value.

The post Poland’s Grupa Lotos in pact to develop hemp-based bio-fuels appeared first on HempToday.

Moroccan cooperative Adrar Nouh is among a group of four organizations whose joint hemp-based project aimed at safeguarding the environment and culture of the Moroccan High Rif was selected to participate in the Solar Decathlon Africa 2019 competition.

Adrar Nouh worked with a team of Moroccan architectural students and international partners in the design of a prototype hemp house of 90 sq. meters.

The project, named SUMINPLANT, incorporates a variety of ancestral hemp from the Rif, transforming it into new aggregates via a process developed by Adrar Nouh co-founder Monika Brümmer through her doctoral thesis at the University of Granada.

Brümmer, owner of Granada-based Cannabric, a maker of load-bearing hemp-clay blocks and bricks, will talk about the project during this year’s International Hemp Building Symposium in Belgium Oct. 16-17 in Brussels.

The IHBA Symposium, which is hosted in a different part of the world each year, is led by veteran hemp builder Steve Allin, the Association’s Director. This year’s host and co-organizer is Wolf Jordan & Co, which is based in Brussels and Kalmthout, Belgium.

By Brian Houlihan | HempToday
The Irish hemp industry continues to grow steadily, with 230 hectares (570 acres) of hemp sown this year in comparison to about 77 hectares (190 acres) in 2017. That’s an increase of 200% in 12 months. Likewise, there’s been almost a 50% increase in the number of licenses issued to grow hemp in Ireland in the last year.

Accordingly more Irish hemp and CBD companies have emerged offering a wider variety of products.

Two Irish hemp entrepreneurs eyeing the global market for their products are Kate Mullaney and Marcus McCabe. The couple has worked in the hemp industry since the early 2000’s. Around 18 years ago they built their office using hemp and since then have assisted on numerous home renovations with based on the material. Initially, they focused on hemp building materials but in recent years have expanded into the food and drinks sector.

Many trials

Mullaney and McCabe initially grew hundreds of acres for their first hemp business which unfortunately failed.

The United Nations has adopted a declaration that binds countries to “respect and protect rural needs,” aiming to “incentivize rural policies that include cannabis in their development strategies.”

The Declaration on the Rights of Peasants and Other People Working in Rural Areas is intended to shift cannabis-related discussions out of a “counter-narcotics approach and mindset,” according to a statement by FAAAT (For Alternative Approaches to Addiction), a think tank. It aims to assist countries in making decisions that will advance development of innovative policies and new market perspectives, FAAAT said.

Legacy cannabis producers

The declaration is particularly intended to guide policymaking in developing countries with a rich history of cannabis cultivation, in places like Morocco, South Africa and India where rural producers have been the main cannabis cultivators and have suffered disproportionately from global cannabis prohibition; even the UN Development Program has admitted that vulnerable groups such as peasant farmers have suffered most.

“The right to cultivate cannabis plants in the areas where its cultivation is ancestral, is recognized and protected by the different international texts protecting indigenous peoples’ traditions,” FAAAT noted.

Policy conference set

The declaration comes in advance of the International Cannabis Policy Conference, Dec. 8-9 in Vienna. The conference is the final global meeting before the UN session on drug policy next March during which new Cannabis Treaty scheduling and a 2019-2029 plan of action will be voted by the respective countries.

A rescheduling that makes CBD-based drug Epidiolex legal has been applauded as a win for cannabinoid-based therapies, but critics say the ruling is another case of the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) overstepping its bounds.

Epidiolex, which recently won U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) approval, is in a classification of CBD-derived “finished dosage formulations.” It has been moved from Schedule 1, the most restricted class of drugs, to schedule 5, the least restrictive. Schedule 5 substances are considered those with “a proven medical use and low potential for abuse.”

DEA ‘overreaches’ again

“In rescheduling Epidiolex, (the) DEA also makes several over-reaching statements beyond simply the scheduling of Epidiolex,” Colorado-based cannabis attorneys Hoban Law Group said in a release. The firm pointed specifically to DEA assertions that “all cannabinoids from cannabis (versus when derived from “marihuana” as defined in the Controlled Substances Act) are controlled substances, seemingly contrary to acts of Congress, judicial decisions and DEA’s own statements.”

The rescheduling sets up an apparent conflict in that the current U.S. Farm Bill makes all products derived from hemp, including CBD, exempt from the DEA’s authority, the Hoban firm noted. The Farm Bill of 2014, which awaits updating to a 2018 version, allows the cultivation, transport, processing and sale of all parts of the plant.

Earlier FDA approval

“While DEA’s handling of Epidiolex was expected, the agency’s penchant for disregarding the law, court orders and its own admissions and directive regarding the lawfulness of hemp continues unabated,” the Hoban statement noted.

The American hemp lobby and other farm groups have been left waiting as the U.S. Congress failed to pass a new Farm Bill under a deadline that ended Sept. 30.

House and Senate Farm Bill conference committee leaders acknowledged last week that they failed to agree on final language for the bill, and indicated they’ll now look to pass a conference report after U.S. midterm elections in November, industry group Vote Hemp noted in a release.

Eager anticipation

Hemp industry stakeholders in the USA are eagerly awaiting renewal of the U.S. Farm Bill, expected to include language that will categorize hemp as an agricultural commodity and remove it from the Drug Enforcement Agency’s list of schedule 1 drugs. Passage is expected to significantly boost CBD sales and advance other hemp sub-sectors

The missed deadline also means a range of farming programs managed under the present Farm Bill do not have any new funding until a new bill is passed or an extension to the current bill is granted. Several thorny political issues still burden the bill.

‘Constituents not happy’

“Farm Bill negotiations can be unpredictable but we do still expect the Hemp Farming Act language to be included in the final bill and are still hopeful that the bill will be signed into law before the end of this year,” Vote Hemp said in the statement. “There is pressure to get a Farm Bill done and members will hear from constituents who are not happy about the failure to make a deal.”

Elixinol Global Ltd. has raised its stake in subsidiary Elixinol Japan from 35% to 50.5% after a restructuring of the business.

The company paid AUS$2.2 million ($1.6 million) for the additional shares, with the investment funded out of Elixinol’s AUS$14.2 million ($10.2 million) cash bank, the company said in a release.

Elixinol Japan made AUS$600,000 ($433,000) in revenue and broke even in the first half of 2018.

Looking to expand distribution

“Japan is a health conscious market and one which is quickly starting to recognize the nutritional and health benefits of hemp-derived CBD and hemp food products,” said Paul Benhaim, Elixinol Global’s CEO, who reported positive ongoing discussions with Japanese distribution partners, some of whom have suggested moving Elixinol products into more mainstream outlets. The company’s products have so far been in limited distribution at high-end retailers. Benhaim also said “regulatory support” in Japan should support market growth.

“This investment will enable us to further grow the market and retain our reputation as the No. 1 hemp-derived product supplier in the Japanese marketplace,” said Makoto Matsumaru, CEO of Elixinol Japan.

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration has taken some cannabidiol off the most restrictive class of controlled substances, a move that allows the sale of the first nonsynthetic, cannabis-derived medicine to win federal approval.

It's a decision that immediately affects CBD producers but also signals the agency’s first admission that the plant has medical value.

DEA moves CBD medicines off Schedule 1, a limited expansion of cannabis access is a post from: Marijuana Business Daily: Financial, Legal & Cannabusiness news for cannabis entrepreneurs

With projections for the growth of the U.S. CBD market diverging wildly, what’s an investor to do?

On the far-out upside, Tampa, Florida-based research firm Brightfield Group, recently told Rolling Stone it expects U.S. CBD sales to hit $22 billion by 2022.

Other forecasters beg to differ. Statista, a highly regarded statistical portal among blue-chip companies including fast-moving consumer goods producers, is projecting CBD sales will gradually grow to $1.8 billion by 2022. That’s in line with cannabis industry research specialist New Frontier Data’s Hemp Business Journal, which in 2016 projected the market would hit $2.1 billion by 2022.

Farm Bill would mean tectonic shift

While U.S. hemp stakeholders anticipate the real opening of the domestic market with the passage of this year’s Farm Bill – a tectonic shift for sure – some industry veterans say Brightfield’s outlook is nonetheless over the top.

“Twenty-two billion seems very high, especially if you compare it with other numbers,” said veteran industry consultant Daniel Kruse of Dusseldorf, Germany-based HempConsult GmbH. Kruse noted, for example, that the entire U.S. dietary supplements market is projected to generate only $57 billion by 2024 – up from $31.7 billion in 2016, according to Statista.

An initiative by hemp stakeholders has been successful in reversing a potential ban on the trading of certain cannabis stocks including CBD and hemp food companies by the German stock exchange.

Initiated and guided by Germany’s HempConsult GmbH, the European Hemp Association have successfully petitioned the clearinghouse Clearstream to shield several CBD companies who were in danger of losing trading services managed by the Luxembourg firm, a wholly owned subsidiary of Deutsche Börse.

Among other companies cleared for trading are Naturally Splendid Enterprises, New Age Farm, Inc., Nutritional High International Inc., all of Canada; and CV Sciences, Inc., of the USA.

More than 100 other cannabis companies had already been excluded from a recently announced Clearstream provision that would stop the deposit of shares, due to take effect Sept. 28, 2018, by putting settlement restrictions on “companies primarily, directly or indirectly, active in the field of medical cannabis.”

Industry sources had said the changes at Clearstream were caused by recently updated guidelines from the local controlling authority, the Commission de Surveillance Financier (CSSF), that are based on outdated cannabis laws in Luxembourg.

Paul Benhaim, CEO at Elixinol Global Ltd., is confirmed as among featured speakers at next year’s first Asian Hemp Summit in Nepal. The event is Feb. 1-2, 2019 at the Gokarna Forest Resort, Kathmandu.

Organizers also announced the launch of a special supporting partnership program designed for small and medium hemp firms, and a call for sponsors for the event.

Benhaim led Elixinol Global’s launch on the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) last January just as national legislation was opening export possibilities for medical cannabis. Then the company launched on the OTCQX Best Market exchange in the USA just ahead of anticipated changes in federal legislation that could supercharge the CBD sector in North America.

Global expert in food, CBD

One of the world’s leading experts in hemp foods and CBD, Benhaim led efforts to open the Australian market for hempseed-based food for humans — which happened last spring.

Elixinol Global’s Hemp Foods Australia (HFA) unit is the southern hemisphere’s biggest hemp food player, and has expanded into four facilities in five years; the company deals in hemp seeds, oil and protein. Elixinol has CBD operations on four continents.

Plenty of barriers still face the startup of a hemp industry in South Africa, but last week’s decriminalization of all cannabis by the country’s constitutional court means new hope for development based on the crop, stakeholders said in the wake of the ruling.

“Coupled with the recent moves by the South African Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), it helps put S.A. on track for a vibrant hemp economy,” said Tony Budden, long-time South African cannabis activist who managed to change his travel plans last minute to attend the court’s judgment, and the celebration that followed.

The DTI recently announced that it is investigating the potential for hemp in a number of applications and sectors, with Minister Rob Davies saying his department recognizes South Africa can become an innovative player in the fast-growing global markets for hemp.

Parallel initiatives afoot

Other initiatives are advancing as well, with the court’s judgment coming at the same time the Cannabis Development Council of South Africa (CDCSA), a new industry body, was celebrating its official launch with a festival in Chintsa, Eastern Cape, one of the country’s poorest provinces but famed for its cannabis growing. CDCSA’s aim is to create viable frameworks for cannabis production and incentivize hemp value chains, while assisting policy making in reshaping current laws.

And the S.A. Department of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries recently announced it established an interdepartmental team to help set up regulatory frameworks for industrial hemp.

The director of Poland’s government-owned Institute of Natural Fibers and Medicinal Plants (IWNiRZ) has left his position to become vice-president for financial affairs at Grupa Lotos, a state-held petroleum company.

Sobków, who was in the IWNiRZ position for two years, led the commercialization of Institute assets worth more than $1 million annually, and early this year engineered government financing of a 14.5 million zloty ($4.2 million) project to expand production of Polish hemp.

Also during Sobków’s tenure, IWNiRZ signed a contract with two U.S.-based hemp firms to sell certified planting seed in The Americas in what the Institute in January called “the largest contract for the sale of industrial cannabis seeds in the history of Poland.”

The post Director of Polish institute departs for position with state oil company appeared first on HempToday.

Denver, Colorado-based Elixinol Global Limited today debuted on the OTCQX Best Market in the USA just ahead of anticipated changes in federal legislation that could supercharge the CBD sector.

Elixinol, which started trading on the Australian Securities Exchange this past January, has interests in the hemp-based CBD, nutraceuticals, food supplements, skincare and medical cannabis sectors. The company has CBD distribution operations in 40 countries across North and South America, Europe, Asia and the Pacific Region.

Farm bill on the cusp

Elixinol’s launch in the USA comes as the 2018 U.S. Farm Bill, expected to include language that will categorize hemp as an agricultural commodity and remove it from the DEA’s list of schedule 1 drugs, is before the U.S. Congress. Passage is expected to significantly boost CBD sales. Deadline for passage of the Farm Bill is the end of September.

Elixinol said in a release that it was the only company in its sector to post a profit in the first six months of 2018, driven mainly by CBD sales via private label, e-commerce, mid-market and bulk channels.

Major advancements in Colorado

“Our Colorado location enabled us to get our seed-to-sale verticalization operational earlier this year, giving us a competitive advantage,” said Gabriel Ettenson, Elixinol General Manager.