by HempingtonPost | Nov 19, 2019
A key House committee has officially announced that a vote on a comprehensive marijuana legalization bill is scheduled for this week.
The House Judiciary Committee said on Monday that the panel will mark up legislation introduced by Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), which would federally deschedule cannabis and address social equity, on Wednesday at 10:00 AM ET. The announcement confirms what sources familiar with the planned development told Marijuana Moment last week.
Nadler’s Marijuana Opportunity Reinvestment and Expungement (MORE) Act has been lauded by advocates for its emphasis on restorative justice for communities most impacted by the drug war.
It calls for a five percent federal tax on marijuana sales, and that revenue would be used to fund programs such as job training, legal aid for those affected by prohibition and small business loans for individuals who are socially and economically disadvantaged. The bill also seeks to lift barriers to licensing and employment in the industry.
Additionally, the legislation would expunge the records of those with prior cannabis convictions, provide for resentencing, block federal agencies from denying public benefits or security clearances as a result of marijuana use and protect immigrants from being denied citizenship over cannabis.
“Our marijuana laws disproportionately harm individuals and communities of color, leading to convictions that damage job prospects, access to housing, and the ability to vote.” Nadler said in a press release. “Recognizing this, many states have legalized marijuana. It’s now time for us to remove the criminal prohibitions against marijuana at the federal level. That’s why I introduced the MORE Act, legislation which would assist communities disproportionately impacted by the enforcement of these laws.”
Text of an amendment in the nature of a substitute from Nadler that Judiciary members will take up was also released on Monday. It includes a new “findings” section that discusses racial disparities in marijuana enforcement, the growing state-level legalization movement and the challenges that individuals from disadvantaged communities face in participating in the market.
“The communities that have been most harmed by cannabis prohibition are benefiting the least from the legal marijuana marketplace,” one provision reads. “A legacy of racial and ethnic injustices, compounded by the disproportionate collateral consequences of 80 years of cannabis prohibition enforcement, now limits participation in the industry.”
Much of the language of the new section is borrowed from a resolution that Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA), co-chair of the Congressional Cannabis Caucus, introduced last year.
“Our federal cannabis policies have been rooted in the past for far too long. As states continue to modernize how we regulate cannabis, Congress has a responsibility to ensure that our policies are fair, equitable, and inclusive,” Lee said in a press release. “I’m pleased that this critical bill includes key tenets from my own legislation to right the wrongs of the failed and racist War on Drugs by expunging criminal convictions, reinvesting in communities of color through restorative justice, and promoting equitable participation in the legal marijuana industry.”
Legalization advocates cheered the committee’s move to take the first congressional vote on ending cannabis prohibition.
“A supermajority of Americans, including majorities of Democrats, Republicans, and independents, support regulating the use of marijuana by responsible adults,” NORML Political Director Justin Strekal said. “Thanks to the leadership of the House Judiciary chairman, never in history have we been closer to ending the failed policy of marijuana criminalization and providing pathways to opportunity for our brothers and sisters who have suffered under its oppressive reign.”
“The MORE Act is the most comprehensive marijuana policy reform bill ever introduced in Congress and is backed by a broad coalition of civil rights, criminal justice, drug policy, and immigration groups. Those who oppose this legislation moving forward are defenders of a failed status-quo that ruins the lives of otherwise law-abiding adults on a daily basis, overwhelming enforced against the poor and communities of color.”
Advocates have been eagerly awaiting a committee vote on the MORE Act, especially since the House overwhelmingly passed a bill to protect banks that service the cannabis industryin September. Some groups, including the ACLU, had implored leadership to delay the banking vote until the chamber passed legislation like the MORE Act that addresses social equity.
“The data speaks for itself—low-income communities and communities of color have disproportionately borne the brunt of the devastation brought on by marijuana prohibition,” Queen Adesuyi, policy manager of national affairs for the Drug Policy Alliance, said. “The MORE Act is the most robust bipartisan legislation so far not only to end federal marijuana prohibition, but also to ensure that the communities that have been hardest hit by prohibition are not left behind.”
“It would be a tragic mistake to have the only marijuana reform bill that passes this Congress be one that solely benefits the industry, despite both the unprecedented support for legalization nationally amongst Americans and all the harm that we know federal prohibition has caused to individuals and communities across this country,” she said. “Fortunately, by ensuring the MORE Act moves forward, several leaders in the House are showing that they understand that this is a matter of fundamental justice that the US Congress needs to address.”
Committee members on both sides of the aisle will be able to introduce amendments to the legislation, but it’s generally expected to advance out of the panel and onto the floor. That said, its fate in the Republican-controlled Senate is far from certain.
This story first appeared at www.marijuanamoment.net
by HempingtonPost | Nov 12, 2019
Henry Ford’s Model T was famously made partly from hemp bioplastic and powered by hemp biofuel. Now, with battery-powered vehicles starting to replace those that use combustion engines, it has been found that hemp batteries perform eight times better than lithium-ion. Is there anything that this criminally-underused plant can’t do?
The comparison has only been proven on a very small scale. (You weren’t expecting a Silicon Valley conglomerate to do something genuinely groundbreaking were you? They mainly just commercialise stuff that’s been invented or at least funded by the state.) But the results are extremely promising.
The experiment was conducted by Robert Murray Smith – who has built up quite a following on his YouTube channel– of FWG Ltd in Kent. He observed a Volts by Amps curve of both the hemp and lithium batteries and found that the power underneath the hemp cell was a value of 31 while that of the lithium cell had a value of just 4. Although he does not claim to have proven anything, he said that the results of his experiment showed that the performance of the hemp cell is “significantly better” than the lithium cell.
It comes as no real surprise, which is presumably why he conducted the experiment. In 2014, scientists in the USfound that waste fibres – ‘shiv’ – from hemp crops can be transformed into “ultrafast” supercapacitors that are “better than graphene”. Graphene is a synthetic carbon material lighter than foil yet bulletproof, but it is prohibitively expensive to make. The hemp version isn’t just better, it costs one-thousandth of the price.
The scientists “cooked” leftover bast fibre – the inner bark of the plant that usually ends up in landfill – into carbon nanosheets in a process called hydrothermal synthesis. “People ask me: why hemp? I say, why not?” said Dr David Mitlin of Clarkson University, New York, in an interview with the BBC. “We’re making graphene-like materials for a thousandth of the price – and we’re doing it with waste.”
Dr Mitlin’s team recycled the fibres into supercapacitors, energy storage devices which are transforming the way electronics are powered. While conventional batteries store large reservoirs of energy and drip-feed it slowly, supercapacitors can rapidly discharge their entire load.
This makes them ideal in machines that require sharp bursts of power. In electric cars, for example, supercapacitors are used for regenerative braking. Releasing this torrent requires electrodes with high surface area, one of graphene’s many phenomenal properties.
Mitlin says that “you can do really interesting things with bio-waste”. With banana peels, for example, “you can turn them into a dense block of carbon – we call it pseudo-graphite – and that’s great for sodium-ion batteries. But if you look at hemp fibre its structure is the opposite – it makes sheets with high surface area – and that’s very conducive to supercapacitors.”
Once the bark has been cooked, “you dissolve the lignin and the semicellulose, and it leaves these carbon nanosheets – a pseudo-graphene structure”. By fabricating these sheets into electrodes and adding an ionic liquid as the electrolyte, his team made supercapacitors which operate at a broad range of temperatures and a high energy density.
Mitlin’s peer-reviewed journal paper ranks the device “on par with or better than commercial graphene-based devices”.
“They work down to 0C and display some of the best power-energy combinations reported in the literature for any carbon,” he adds. “For example, at a very high power density of 20 kW/kg (kilowatt per kilo) and temperatures of 20, 60, and 100C, the energy densities are 19, 34, and 40 Wh/kg (watt-hours per kilo) respectively.” Fully assembled, their energy density is 12 Wh/kg – which can be achieved at a charge time less than six seconds.
At the end of 2018, Texas-based electric motorcycle company Alternet announced that it was working with Mitlin to power motorbikes for its ReVolt Electric Motorbikes subsidiary.
So there you have it. If we already knew that there is no need to use the fossil fuels that are destroying the planet’s climate, because hemp biofuel provides a better alternative, we now know that there is no need to destroy the environment by mining for lithium and the materials that are used in batteries. We can literally grow technology. Hemp can save and power the world.
This article was first published in The Quarter Leaf issue 1.
by HempingtonPost | Oct 4, 2019
Paragon Processing, the nation’s largest hemp processing facility, is looking to start full-scale operation in the Colorado City area within the next 20-30 days.
“We’re actively hiring people so that we can ramp up,” said William Chavis, partner of Paragon Processing, located about 23 miles south of Pueblo. “It wouldn’t make sense to ramp up with our current staff, so it takes time to get people in the building, train them, have a good understanding of what’s going on.”
Paragon Processing currently employs between 30 and 45 staff members. It is looking to expand to 250 workers by the end of the year and 500 in approximately two years. Available positions include maintenance people, general laborers and skilled tradesmen, according to Chavis.
“We have found very strong people out of the oil and mining industries that have experience using these types of equipment, but not necessarily for this purpose,” Chavis said. “We invite as many local people as we can to come in and help out with some of the general labor.”
The Paragon Process extraction facility is 256,000 square feet. At the facility, hemp biomass is tested for pesticides, heavy metals, and microbials. Biomass that passes each test is stored and processed. Currently, the facility is capable of processing 1 million pounds of biomass each month. Climate controlled storage is available for 50 million pounds.
“In the event that a farmer has 2-3 million pounds, we’re able to take that all in at one point in time, even if we can’t process for them in a single month,” Chavis said.
Through extraction, a winterized crude is produced from the biomass.
“That crude material consists of some of the other plant extracts other that the actual cannabinoids,” Chavis said. “That crude is around 50% cannabinoids, a mixture of everything from CBD, CBM, CBG, CBC as well as minute amounts of THC.”
Product must contain less than 0.3% THC content in order to be transported out of the facility.
“Just on the science side alone, if you were able to take a product that started with 0.3% and you concentrate it, it’s likely going to have over 0.3%,” Chavis said. “To further refine it, we use distillation.”
After distillation, THC content can also be removed through THC remediation or through production of a CBD isolate, a 99% or pure CBD product that contains no THC.
“Hemp is currently one of the largest cash crops that people are switching to,” Chavis said. “There is actually 15 times more volume of hemp being grown and produced this year than previous years.”
Paragon Processing currently has a sister facility located in Colorado Springs handling goods manufacturing. CBD distillate and isolate produced at the extraction facility may be used for food products, lotions and other consumer goods.
“We’re very interested in taking applications of all sorts,” Chavis said. “We invite people to go to our website to take a look and fill out the application.”
This story originally appeared at The Pueblo Chieftain.
by HempingtonPost | Aug 20, 2019
A federal financial agency released updated guidelines on banking in the hemp industry on Monday, following up on requests from multiple lawmakers to provide clarity on the issue.
The National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) said in its interim guidance that providing banking services to hemp businesses is allowable since the crop and its derivatives were federally legalized under the 2018 Farm Bill. The notice also emphasized the economic potential of hemp and the role credit unions can play as the industry continues to develop.
“Lawful hemp businesses provide exciting new opportunities for rural communities,” NCUA Chairman Rodney Hood said in a press release. “I believe today’s interim guidance keeps with the mission of the nation’s cooperative credit system to serve people who have been overlooked and underserved.”
“Many credit unions have a long and successful history of providing services to the agriculture sector,” he said. “My expectation is that credit unions will thoughtfully consider whether they are able to safely and properly serve lawfully operating hemp-related businesses within their fields of membership.”
In a letter sent to Sen. Michael Bennet (D-CO) last month, which the presidential candidate’s Senate office shared exclusively with Marijuana Moment, Hood noted that NCUA was “working on possible future guidance to financial institutions”but that such guidance would be subject to change depending on what regulations the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) ultimately develops.
In the meantime, the new interim guidance notes that “growth in hemp-related commerce could provide new economic opportunities for some communities, and will create a need for such businesses to be able to access capital and financial services” while clarifying that credit unions “may provide the customary range of financial services for business accounts, including loans, to lawfully operating hemp related businesses within their fields of membership.”
While NCUA said that it is “generally a credit union’s business decision as to the types of permissible services and accounts to offer,” it highlighted the need to comply with the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA) and with Anti-Money Laundering (AML) requirements, in particular:
—Credit unions need to maintain appropriate due diligence procedures for hemp-related accounts and comply with BSA and AML requirements to file Suspicious Activity Reports (SARs) for any activity that appears to involve potential money laundering or illegal or suspicious activity. It is the NCUA’s understanding that SARs are not required to be filed for the activity of hemp-related businesses operating lawfully, provided the activity is not unusual for that business. Credit unions need to remain alert to any indication an account owner is involved in illicit activity or engaging in activity that is unusual for the business.
—If a credit union serves hemp-related businesses lawfully operating under the 2014 Farm Bill pilot provisions, it is essential the credit union knows the state’s laws, regulations, and agreements under which each member that is a hemp-related business operates. For example, a credit union needs to know how to verify the member is part of the pilot program. Credit unions also need to know how to adapt their ongoing due diligence and reporting approaches to any risks specific to participants in the pilot program.
—When deciding whether to serve hemp-related businesses that may already be able to operate lawfully–those not dependent on the forthcoming USDA regulations and guidelines for hemp production–the credit union needs to first be familiar with any other federal and state laws and regulations that prohibit, restrict, or otherwise govern these businesses and their activity. For example, a credit union needs to know if the business and the product(s) is lawful under federal and state law, and any relevant restrictions or requirements under which the business must operate.
“Hemp provides new opportunities for communities with an economic base involving agriculture,” the notice states. “The NCUA encourages credit unions to thoughtfully consider whether they are able to safely and properly serve lawfully operating hemp-related businesses within their fields of membership.”
After USDA releases its rules for the hemp industry, which are expected to come ahead of the 2020 planting season, NCUA said it “will issue additional guidance on this subject.”
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who like Bennet has also pressured federal regulators to clear up confusion around hemp banking, took credit for NCUA’s response and celebrated the new guidance.
“I’m delighted to hear the NCUA has answered my call on behalf of Kentuckians to ensure the legal hemp industry can access much-needed financial services,” McConnell said in a press release. “Although President Trump signed into law my initiative last year to remove hemp from the federal list of controlled substances, many of my constituents have told me about their difficulty receiving loans and other services that are necessary to successfully run a hemp business.”
“Through this guidance by the NCUA, I look forward to more hemp farmers, processors and manufacturers starting or growing their operations with the help of Kentucky’s credit unions,” he said. “As Senate Majority Leader, I’ll continue advocating for Kentucky’s priorities throughout the federal government, and I’m proud of today’s positive news.”
Credit unions have generally been friendlier to the marijuana and hemp industries than have conventional banks, and NCUA has similarly taken a more proactive role in evolving to meet the demands of these burgeoning markets.
For example, the agency’s head clarified earlier this month that credit unions wouldn’t be punished simply for serving hemp businesses so long as they were following standard procedures. NCUA also released a draft rule in July that would allow people with past drug convictions to work at credit unions.
Cannabis banking issues have received significant congressional attention this session, with a bipartisan consensus emerging around creating a legislative fix so that hemp and marijuana businesses are able to access financial services.
The hemp industry in particular has enjoyed bipartisan support since the crop was legalized, but while marijuana remains a federally controlled substance, more lawmakers from across the aisle are expressing interest in affording cannabis businesses the same access in order to increase financial transparency and mitigate public safety risks associated with operating on a largely cash-only basis.
The House Financial Services Committee approved a bill in March that would protect banks that service marijuana businesses from being penalized by federal regulators, and the Senate Banking Committee also held a hearing on the issuelast month.
Banking Chairman Mike Crapo (I-ID), who suggested earlier this year that his panel wouldn’t convene to discuss the matter as long as cannabis is federally illegal, has since taken a stance that the issue needs to be resolved.
But while advocates hoped that legislation to address marijuana banking problems would be taken up by the full House ahead of the August recess, that window closed and attention is now turned to a potential hearing in the fall.
This story originally appeared at Marijuana Moment.
by HempingtonPost | Jul 8, 2019
The Emperor’s New Clothes should have been crafted from hemp all along and Americans are just now discovering it.
It was a Wednesday afternoon in the middle of June in Will Smith-popularized Bel Air, California where a two-day cannabis conference and expo was being held at a mansion. A level of investment not entirely atypical in Los Angeles, the world’s fastest growing cannabis market.
Cannabis gatherings of this magnitude require special logistics. After a veritable park-and-ride from somewhere near UCLA, I’d arrived at WeedCon West, where cannabis education, product sampling, and augmented multisensory experiences, all met in a lavish and expansive setting.
Larger cannabis companies like Sol Distro, Cresco Labs, Kushy Punch, and Marley Naturals were interwoven with smaller, and newer brands. Cannabis-derived “full spectrum protection”) suntan lotion manufacturer and sun care experts, Divios Naturals, small grows like Greenshock Farm and Stone Road Farms, and industry packaging experts, The Packaging Company, what seemed like 50 or so other cannabis companies and vendors.
(A special shout-out to my kinfolk, the team from Hawaii-based Pakalolo Seed Co. My 83 year-old, gardening-master dad’s going to sprout your seeds for us. Watch for an article later in the year.)
I navigated my way through them all, seeking a dose of opinion, a taste of product, and a sprinkling of wisdom.
I emerged from a bathroom break waving my hands feverishly (because, ironically, there were no towels in the mansion’s restroom), I made my way to an expansive pool replete with inflatable swans and ripples left by some guy who’d decided to disrobe and jump in.
Someone handed me what I call a “free-roll” pre-rolled joint: Ingredients? No details necessary.
A woman in a shimmery, yellow evening gown walked past me, followed by an Ignite model holding a plate with those cute, little egg rolls that seem like a good idea until you’ve had ten of them. Fearless, I made my to the kitchen for my own plate followed by some cannabis-infused edible desserts.
I explored the cleverly themed rooms to the discovery of Herer Group’s I was drawn to the cigar lounge-like, wood-clad lair partly out of curiosity, partly because they had comfortable looking chairs. The Herer Group team being the only other people wearing suits was inviting, as well.
Black suits, at that. And having recently dabbed outback with Dab Nation, this was no funeral. It was more the celebration of an industry legend, Jack Herer, and what he was trying to tell people about cannabis all along.
A convincing videographer, the allure of faux fur draped across a shoulder, and the generous goodie bag had me promptly seated to learn more. More about the predictions that predate where the American cannabis industry is today, a book into which they were scribed, and the man who wrote it.
Jack Herer, the man
Nicknamed the Hemperor, activist Jack Herer (1939 – 2010) left his mark on American subculture by resurfacing age-old cultures, studies, and assertions that cannabis for food, fiber, fuel, medicine, recreation, and other purposes can solve most of the world’s most consequential environmental, social and economic problems.
But Jack wasn’t always a cannabis advocate. As a conservative-leaning veteran most of his life, he wasn’t introduced to the plant until irresistible, love-smitten pressure led him to it in his 30’s (more on that later).
“When I went off to the army when I was 17 years old, I believed in America and the rights of freedom,” Jack Herer is quoted as saying. “But today I believe my government is lying to the American people and that my president, George Bush, is a criminal.”
A prison stint in the name of advocacy gave Jack Herer time to pen the first draft of a book revered within the cannabis industry and respected throughout the world: The Emperor Wears No Clothes.
The book
The Emperor Wears No Clothes is a play on Hans Christian Andersen’s The Emperor’s New Clothes, a story where swindling weavers who trick the king, granting him and invisible, “supernatural” garment that cannot be seen or touched by any person of illegitimate birth. Effectively convincing the king he was looking dapper when, in fact, he was naked.
In this version, Jack Herer effectively blows the king’s cover, revealing that cannabis prohibition is an injustice to the American people, brought about by nefarious policy making. Sinister political motives in the 1930’s demonized the plant in all its forms (marijuana and hemp) to preserve the interests of powerful politicians, oil tycoons, publishers, and status-quo conservatives.
Citing Henry Ford, “and other futuristic, organic, engineering geniuses” in the early 1900’s, the book shares published findings that biomass from corn stalks, cannabis, waste paper and the like could replace 90 percent of all fossil fuel used in the world today (coal, oil, natural gas, etc.).
“Government and oil and coal companies, etc., will insist that burning biomass fuels is no better than using up our fossil fuel reserves, as far as pollution goes; but this is patently untrue,” Jack Herer wrote. “Why? Because, unlike fossil fuels, biomass comes from living (not extinct) plants that continue to remove carbon dioxide pollution from our atmosphere as they grow, through photosynthesis. Furthermore, biomass fuels do not contain sulfur.”
Decades later, the book’s foreshadowing is coming to light.
This is a great, thorough, award-nominated, 25-minute video rendition of The Emperor Wears No Clothes delivered by people who know it well. And here’s a free online version of the book in its entirety, with rights released by his family.
The people & the company
The Herer Group is built upon the principles of both the man and the book, and consists of multiple vertically integrated cultivation, manufacturing and distribution companies licensed in the state of California. The Group manages Herer Distribution, Herer Manufacturing, and Herer Labs & Research.
Cannabis sourced from family-sized farms is tested with Herer Labs before being manufactured into award-winning (first-place win for its cannabis concentrate at the industry’s famed 2018 Emerald Cup) flower, pre-rolls, vape pens sold under the Dr. Delights, Infusio and The Original Jack Herer brand names. These craft products are then distributed by Herer Distribution to licensed cannabis dispensaries statewide.
As I sat with them on this particular day, The Group’s people appeared as elegant as the brand. And that’s what’s needed as California’s cannabis market becomes flooded with thousands of new products: Distinction.
The Group pays homage to cannabis industry pioneers in buying their crops and keeping their cash flow going. “If it wasn’t for those who are the true legacy of what it is that we’re all building our companies on, if it wasn’t for the small growers who put the love and intention into putting out a product that they could take care of their families at a time when it wasn’t legal and paid the ultimate price, I wouldn’t be able to do what I am today,” Dan Herer, Jack’s son and founder of the Jack Herer Foundation and Herer Group, told me when we sat together.
The company plans to further expand those industry partnerships next year. “I’m really looking forward to the end of this year and going into next year with these partnerships with small farms, with folks who have the love and intent that has given us all the power to do the things that we need to do,” Dan Herer said.
For cannabis businesses, keeping with the Hemperor’s quest for sustainable hemp adoption across the nation, and the liberation to enjoy, research, develop, and heal from the cannabis plant requires commitment. It means that whether you’re touching the plant or not, you still know there is a war against prohibition to be fought in the United States, and in some form, you’re contributing to the fight.
“What we have here in California and across the United States is just another level of prohibition—it’s not the end of prohibition because when they still create laws that are based on the fears and falses of prohibition,” Dan Herer believes. “When they use those to create the regulatory framework in which we’re building all of our businesses, it fractures the foundation, it will be bound to fail if we don’t correct it.”
The products
The Jack Herer cannabis strain is a multi award-winning sativa-dominant hybrid created by Sensi Seeds to honor its namesake. Aromatic and cerebral, The Group’s flower takes form as The Original Jack Herer with premium buds from Herer Farms and an adherence to high quality standards.
“In the cannabis world, we try not to encourage blind attachment to brands, but rather products,” California delivery service provider Ganja Goddessdiscloses on its website. “However, the Original Jack Herer™ line of products is genuinely backed by both history and anecdotal support…break out the canvas, or pen pad – this strain will inspire the best part of your creative side without weighing down your limbs.”
“This is a brand that has more fans than customers now,” Herer Group partner, Latif Horst told me.
Some consumers use some Herer products to keep from being bummed out, and others to totally veg out. “I choose a strain like Jack Herer or Lemon Tree for rainy days when I need to be active, as they lift me up beyond the depression of clouds and precipitation,” said Twitter user @c0uchl0cked (who also provides what I’m wagering is deep expertise on effective use of downtime). “If I have nothing to do and can afford to waste a day, indica edibles help me enjoy some serious relaxation.”
That’s free testimonial website copy, right there.
And despite the incomplete sentence at the end, this is a rather descriptive tweet about the treatment applications and perceived benefits users have experienced with Herer products.
Jack’s inspiration
So what got this all started in the first place? What turned Jack Herer, this former Goldwater Republican into a cannabis imbiber and advocate?
According to Dan, it was a girlfriend who essentially said he dad needed to smoke weed, because he was too boring, otherwise.
Disclosure: I have no financial interest or positions in the aforementioned companies. This information is for educational purposes and does not constitute financial and/or legal advice. But Select CBD did hook me up with a great free vape pen. Follow me on Instagram and TwitterCheck out my website.
This story originally appeared on Forbes.
Andre Bourque (@SocialMktgFella) is a cannabis industry connector, brand advisor, contributing writer, and the Vice President of Business Development for Verdantis Advisors, a full-service cannabis consulting agency. Verdantis specializes in cannabis industry investments, mergers and acquisitions, funding, partnerships, marketing, and media. Andre is the managing director of the cannabis division of Miramar Brands, a legacy full-service licensing agency representing Elle Magazine, Target, Kohl’s, Spalding, and other leading brands. We work with cannabis brands to leverage powerful mainstream names in the production of new products, channels, and markets. Andre is also the managing director of North America for blockchain marketing agency ICO Launch Group. In addition to Forbes, Andre’s articles have been featured in The Huffington Post, Entrepreneur.com, Benzinga, Yahoo Finance, Ebony, CIO Magazine, ComputerWorld, and Social Media Today. Andre has held technology marketing positions in the aerospace industry, at Sun Microsystems, Intel, Technorati, and several startups. Andre is a card-carrying member of Souplantation’s Club Veg.
