RE:From this AM's Globe & Mail The federal government is in the final stage of licensing 208 new cannabis companies, which would more than triple the number of official producers and vastly increase the industry's capacity in the lead-up to legalization, federal officials said.
Health Canada has been under pressure in recent months to speed up the approval process for producers, with frequent complaints in the industry that the application process took years to complete.
To this point, Health Canada has given licences to cultivate cannabis to 80 companies in the country. However, only 36 of these companies have also obtained their licence to sell, which requires companies to grow two crops for inspection by Health Canada.
The fact that 208 companies are in the late stages of their application stands to drastically reshape the market for legal cannabis in Canada in coming months. It is the first time that this number has been revealed publicly.
B.C. lawyer Kirk Tousaw, who works for a number of players in the cannabis industry, said Health Canada has hired more staff to process applications in recent months.
"There has always been a large backlog," he said. "What we have seen in the last six months is a dramatic increase in the number of successful applicants and the pace of applications moving through the system."
Still, experts said it remains unclear if the new licences will be enough to ensure a smooth transition to a legal regime. The government's objective is to pass Bill C-45 through the Senate and legalize cannabis by July, 2018, with the goal of quickly making a dent in the existing black market.
In a year-end interview with the French-language TVA network, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said legalization will not occur on July 1, which is Canada Day. His office clarified on Tuesday that the objective is still to do this before July 1.
Rosalie Wyonch, a policy analyst at the C.D. Howe Institute, said newly licensed producers will not be in a position to serve the legal market in short order but that Health Canada should continue to process applications "as fast as they can."
"The more producers they license, the sooner they can start producing product," she said.
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