Emerging cannabis industry requires fertile soil

Africa produces more than 38 000 tonnes of cannabis annually. However, of the over 50 countries around the world that have legalised some form of cannabis for medicinal use, only three are from Africa. Many African governments are looking to leverage the opportunities from the legalisation of cannabis and the international demand for the continent’s legally produced cannabis.

Lost opportunity?

Professor Motlalepula G Matsabisa, from the School of Medicine at the University of the Free State, is concerned that South Africa might be missing the boat in terms of local medicinal cannabis research. “We seem to miss the bigger picture. We waste time by looking at the small things like recreational use.” The numbers are impressive. The global legal marijuana size is expected to reach $66.3 billion by 2025, and the medical cannabis market $82.19 billion by 2027.

“The market is huge and awareness about the advantages of cannabis is increasing. In 2019, Business Insider SA projected that the South African dagga industry could be worth R27 billion within four years, although export-quality cannabis may be a problem. South Africa could be a world leader in this emerging industry, but rather than being bold, we fiddle with incremental changes to legislation.”

Matsabisa cautioned that cannabis will not be going away, but without proper regulation, illicit trade will increase; the formal economic value will diminish; and poverty, dependency, and lawlessness will surge. “We must innovate and not just follow others. We have our own unique environment and do not need to settle for a plug-and-play solution,” he concluded.Emerging cannabis industry requires fertile soil and seems to miss the bigger picture. We waste time by looking at small things like recreational use.- Professor Motlalepula G Matsabisa, University of the Free State

Africa produces more than 38 000 tonnes of cannabis annually. However, of the over 50 countries around the world that have legalized some form of cannabis for medicinal use, only three are from Africa. Many African governments are looking to leverage the opportunities from the legalization of cannabis and the international demand for the continent’s legally produced cannabis.

Regulations

If cannabis has such health benefits, why is it so regulated? Daphney Mokgadi Fafudi, a Medicine Control Officer with the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (SAHPRA), said, “We need evidence – solid evidence-based data – to ensure that these products are of good quality, safe and effective".

“We enable research by issuing licenses and permits. For the past two years, we have been working with various departments, such as Agriculture, Justice, and Police, to make sure that the emerging cannabis industry can grow while adhering to the Medicines Act,” she said.

In 2018, a Constitutional Court judgement required adjustments to the Act. That ruling released hemp, which is a low-THC cannabis (cannabis that contains a small amount of tetrahydrocannabinol), from regulation. However, CBD – cannabidiol, another natural compound found in the cannabis genus – is still regulated as a cannabinoid under the Act.

SAHPRA also removed the cannabis inscription from the Act and from schedule 7 (banned substances). THC now falls under schedule 6 if it contains over 0.2% of the compound, but processed products made from cannabis containing 0,001% or less of THC are exempted from the Act.

“CBD remains in schedule 4. However, we made an exception in terms of complementary products. If these contain less than 600 mg of CBD of the total sales pack and they provide a maximum daily dose of less than 20 mg without making any health claims, we will allow it for complementary medicines as per schedule 0,”

Fafudi explained. Processed products, intended for ingestion, made from the raw cannabis plant, containing less than 0,0075% of the naturally carrying quantity of the CBD, also fall under schedule 0.

Agriculture’s role

Cannabis falls in the industrial crop category. Thabo Ramashala, Director: of Plant Production at the Department of Agriculture, Land Reform, and Rural Development, said, “During 2019, Cabinet decided that the country must diversify its economy by, among others, commercialising cannabis.

“Thus my department was tasked to lead the drafting of the Cannabis Master Plan for South Africa together with other government and private sector stakeholders. Our approach is that the regulatory issues must be sorted out for us to succeed in deriving the economic, social and environmental benefits from this commodity. The Masterplan provides the framework to commercialise cannabis – dagga and hemp.

”The department looks at various aspects besides coordination. “There are issues around seed, because without proper seed and a formal seed industry, the cannabis industry will not be sustainable. We must also mobilise the farmers to participate. South Africa shall have a cannabis industry. But, it is up to us to define how we want this industry to be and ensure all other restraints are removed responsibly, to diversify the economy and create jobs,”

Ramashala said.Vukile Nkabinde, the Director: Policy Unit within the Department of Small Business Development, added,

“We want to ensure that small enterprises are capacitated and competitive so that, as our National Development Plan says, we can peg our economic growth and job creation through small enterprises. Research is a must. Especially around our medical and commercial imports. We must advance this entrepreneurial state to enable these jobs we envisage from the cannabis industry.”

Indigenous Knowledge Systems

Dr Hlupheka Chabalala, National Director of the Indigenous Knowledge-Based Technology Innovation Unit of the Department of Science and Innovation, said that the department’s work is backed by the necessity to acknowledge the importance of indigenous knowledge systems and technology-based innovation. “We use the entire value chain as the framework that guides our work. We call it the Ubuntu-based Bio-Innovation Model. ‘Ubuntu’, because when it comes to cannabis, in particular, injustices were visited upon our people, especially the wisdom keepers, like African medicine practitioners.

Our work seeks to mainstream the use of cannabis, whether it’s for medicinal purposes, or for cosmeceuticals, nutraceuticals, or health infusions.”

He explained that innovation should be inclusive, saying that the holders of the knowledge, the primary researchers, must be consulted and receive fair recognition. “We need to think about enterprise development and conscious commercialization. Access and benefit sharing should accrue to the wisdom keepers who are actually informing the researchers. But at the same time, research must empower our people so that they own the means of production; they need not be passive recipients of what emerges from the research. ”Those responsible for various forms of legislation and regulation must use evidence, not only scientific research but also evidence that comes from these communities, he said.

Cian McClelland, the CEO of Druids Garden, a wellness company that specializes in the cultivation and production of traditional medicines from Africa representing the private sector, reported that “We have collected massive amounts of research data across different elements of cannabis production. We are now in the process of registering some of those products. We believe that cannabis can revolutionize the economy and social development in South Africa. But it is critical that it is done with community-based structures and with a social development ethos.

Research and development at the CSIR High-quality germplasm, drying, downstream processing, analysis and product formulation are bottlenecks in the industry, especially for smallholder farmers and enterprises, explained Dr Blessed Okole, CSIR research group leader for agro-processing. The CSIR is taking the lead in finding affordable solutions to these bottlenecks by developing technologies and processes that can be easily adapted by small and big enterprises. This can only be achieved by working in consortiums to fast-track the process, and putting proudly South African products on the market. The CSIR received three permits to work on cannabis. One group is developing simple extraction technologies that can be used in rural communities to add value to crops. The second group is in Durban and is focusing on a high-technology carbon-dioxide extraction method, while the third permit is used by the nanotechnology team in Pretoria, working on improving drug formulations.

This article was compiled following a webinar titled, ‘Cannabis: Opportunities for research, product development and job creation’ at the 7th CSIR Biennial Conference. Its participants were Dr Blessed Okole, CSIR Research Group Leader: Agro-processing; Dr Hlupheka Chabalala, National Director of the Indigenous Knowledge-Based Technology Innovation Unit of the Department of Science and Innovation; Cian McClelland, Chief Executive Officer of Druids Garden; Prof. Motlalepula G Matsabisa, Professor of Pharmacology and Director: Research and Teaching, University of the Free-State; Vukile Nkabinde, Director: National Small Enterprise Development Masterplan, Department of Small Business Development; Ms Daphney Mokgadi Fafudi, Medicine Control Officer, South African Health Products Regulatory Authority; and Thabo Ramashala, Director: Plant Production, Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development.