Acting Prime Minister and Attorney-General Aiyaz Sayed-Khaiyum says they are only talking about planting industrial hemp and not medicinal hemp.
While speaking during the Attorney General’s Conference, Sayed-Khaiyum says medicinal hemp has higher levels of tetrahydrocannabinol or THC and they do not want to get into that space.
THC is the chemical responsible for most of marijuana's psychological effects.
Sayed-Khaiyum says industrial hemp has low levels of THC and even then there is a licensing regime.
The AG also shared a story when he was a child and how people used to smoke pot in Sigatoka after a hard day’s work in the farm.
He also says it is not about going back into time, it is not about getting high, it’s about industrial hemp for industrial purposes.
The government is expected to table an Industrial Hemp Bill in Parliament next year.
Sayed-Khaiyum says the growing of industrial hemp needs to be licensed and lawyers need to be aware of how the licensing regime will work.
He says lawyers will need to understand the ambit of the law when the law will be introduced.
Sayed-Khaiyum says they will need to understand the rights and obligations of those who will get the licenses, those who will be caught out or those who won’t be caught out.
He told the participants that the law needs to evolve but at the same time it needs to be just.
Sayed-Khaiyum says they will need to heavily engage with the private sector because there is no point in planting industrial hemp when no one is going to manufacture it.
He further says the private sector needs to actually make those investments and government has to look at what it has to do in terms of incentivizing of that.
Sayed-Khaiyum also says they also have to consider what type of private sector players they want in this space.
It has been highlighted that industrial hemp has been called a wonder plant due to its 25,000 different uses which include food, fiber, ropes, textiles, paper and building materials.
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