Attempts have been made to monopolize the cultivation of cannabis for medicinal and industrial purposes, according to President Rodrigo Chaves. His government is working with a view to delivering the necessary regulations next September for the law to come into force, which was signed by then President Carlos Alvarado on March 2nd.
The CBD market —or cannabidiol, a component of the cannabis plant used for therapeutic purposes— will be worth $60 billion “in two or three years,” Chaves assured, without citing his source, this Wednesday at a press conference in Presidential House. That is why it is convenient to put that industry to work, he suggested.
“Here we are making entanglements with a lot of technical things,” criticized the president, referring to whether it is necessary to grant licenses for the cultivation of cannabis for the uses contemplated by law. “A license to plant corn? A license to plant, what do I know, abaca? Hemp is not a psychotropic plant,” he said.
“There, what many are doing —or were, and that is why we have taken forceful actions such as removing personnel— is trying to create new monopolies. No, gentlemen,” the chief executive sentenced. Chaves affirmed that the regulation of this law will not be done “accommodating someone’s nest”, but it will be for the benefit of the country.
Simple and straightforward regulation
The President promised that his team will deliver a regulation for medicinal and industrial cannabis that is simple and practical, and that regulates “what needs to be regulated”, without further ado. The law gives a period of six months to design the regulation, which will be fulfilled in September, although former President Alvarado had promised to have it ready before the change of government, in May.
The Minister of the Presidency, Natalia Díaz, who coordinates the process, explained that “several institutions are involved” in the preparation of the regulation, such as the Ministry of Health, the Costa Rican Institute on Drugs (ICD) and the Ministry of Public Security. “Obviously it has very technical issues involved,” she said, citing “technical studies for licenses and so on.”
The Presidency is committed to “having all the information” necessary to draw up the regulation “within the established period.” This regulation regulates the production and use of cannabis and its derivatives for medicinal and therapeutic use, and of the fibers that are extracted from hemp for industrial purposes.
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