Pubdate: Tue, 29 Apr 2003
Source: National Post (Canada)
Copyright: 2003 Southam Inc.
Contact:  http://www.nationalpost.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/286
Author: Dirk Meissner, Canadian Press

B.C. POT GROWERS FIRST TO BE CERTIFIED ORGANIC

DUNCAN -- Eric Nash and his wife, Wendy Little, grow the healthiest legal 
pot in Canada.

Nash and Little are the first federally licensed medical marijuana growers 
in Canada to have their crop officially certified 100-per-cent organic.

It's a healthy bonus for the thousands of Canadians who could use it to 
ease suffering from a wide range of conditions, including multiple 
sclerosis, cancer, arthritis and AIDS, Nash says in an interview at his 
home in this Vancouver Island community about 70 kilometres north of Victoria.

The Certified Organic Associations of British Columbia, an organization 
likely more accustomed to monitoring the production of carrots or spinach, 
granted Nash and Little certified organic status this month.

In B.C., where the RCMP says black market marijuana worth billions is the 
province's largest cash crop, Nash displays his organic certification like 
a badge of honour.

Nash, 44, and Little, 41, do not fit the stereotype of typical marijuana 
growers or pot smokers.

Both graduated from university with honours, Little in education and Nash 
in visual arts. They have an eight-year-old daughter and live in an 
attractive, art-filled home in an older Duncan neighbourhood.

Nash, a Web site designer and former professional horticulturist, says 
organic certification is a step forward in the slow march toward getting 
Ottawa to acknowledge that marijuana has wide-ranging medicinal qualities.

"It's raising the credibility of medicinal marijuana as a legitimate 
medicine, as a safe medicine, as an alternative medicine to all the 
pharmaceuticals and other things that people tried that don't work," Nash says.

People who are sick or in pain deserve access to medicine -- what Nash 
calls his marijuana -- grown without the use of toxic pesticides and 
fertilizers, he says.

"I want to ensure these people are getting certified organic marijuana for 
their health problem," Nash says. "I want people to know it's been 
inspected every step of the way, from the soils to the fertilizers."

He gladly admits telling an agricultural feed store employee recently that 
he was growing organic marijuana for medicinal purposes, legally.

"Her jaw just about dropped on the floor," Nash says.

Nash and Little are two of the 36 Canadians licensed by Health Canada to 
produce medical marijuana for ill people.

The federal Marijuana Medical Access Regulations, enacted in July 2001, 
allow people to apply to legally grow their own marijuana or designate a 
grower for their supply.
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MAP posted-by: Beth