The Financial Post reports in its Thursday, May 9, edition that applicants seeking to obtain a Health Canada licence to grow and process weed and those seeking to sell pot in the medical market, will now have to show that they have a fully built cultivation site ready to go before they even begin the application process, Health Canada announced Wednesday.
The Post's Vanmala Subramaniam writes that currently, applicants had to merely secure a site before starting the application process. In many cases, a pre-approval letter from Health Canada stating that an application was in the queue would enable an applicant to begin raising money from investors in the sector to fully build out a site.
Lawyer Trina Fraser says, "Now you have to raise tens of millions and convince investors that you will get a Health Canada licence, when you have no physical proof of it."
To date, there are still hundreds of applications that Health Canada is processing.
The department said it is implementing these adjustments to "better allocate" departmental resources. More than 70 per cent of approved applicants have yet to submit an evidence package showing a completed facility that met requirements stated in the Cannabis Act.
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