A Weekly Roundup of Stories We Found Interesting – From The Profound To The Profane

Black Markets are Being Flooded with Fake Weed Vape Cartridges
While states like Colorado have rigorous mandated licensing and testing regulations which guarantee consumers are being sold high-quality product from legitimate companies, no such controls exist for the black market. Even cartridges branded with the names of the industry’s biggest companies can’t be trusted. That’s because there is a booming wholesale market for empty counterfeit cartridges produced in Shenzhen, China, the very same place where many legitimate cannabis companies source their hardware.

The Top Selling Items at Marijuana Dispensaries as Sales Hit $4.8M in Massachusetts
The state’s two recreational marijuana dispensaries have sold plenty of edibles, like gummies and chocolate bars, since they opened just before Thanksgiving. But the most popular product, not surprisingly, is plain old weed.

In Canada, You Can Study Marijuana Production for College Credit
In January 2020, McGill University in Montreal (aka Harvard of Canada) will offer a graduate degree in cannabis production, open only to students with botany backgrounds or bachelor’s degrees in related fields.

Pennsylvania Throws Out All 8 Marijuana Research Applications
Pennsylvania’s ambitious plan to become the national center for medical marijuana research has a major setback. The state Department of Health on Wednesday rejected the applications of all eight marijuana growers who had planned to partner with the state’s medical schools. Regulators said the applications were riddled with mistakes and missing information.

Canada’s Cannabis Shortage is No Surprise
Prior to legalization, Canada’s cannabis market produced around 80,000 kilos per year for around 200,000 medical marijuana patients. In 2017, the Canadian Parliamentary Budget Office issued a report stating that by 2018 Canadians would consume up to 655,000 kilos of cannabis and that by 2021, that figure could rise to 734,000 kilos per year, catering for more than 5 million cannabis users.

Recreational Marijuana is Officially Legal in Michigan
At 12:01 a.m. Thursday, Michigan turned green and became the 10th state in the nation to legalize marijuana for adult recreational use, with many, many caveats.

The Little Town That Pot Built
Garden City in Colorado is a small town of a square mile and has fewer than 300 residents. But it could afford to spend $3 million on downtown infrastructure upgrades thanks to its four bustling marijuana retailers which collected over $2 million last year from sales taxes alone.