Pubdate: Mon, 04 Apr 2016
Source: Ottawa Sun (CN ON)
Copyright: 2016 Canoe Limited Partnership
Contact: http://www.ottawasun.com/letter-to-editor
Website: http://www.ottawasun.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/329
Author: Paula McCooey
Page: 6

GROW-OP SEES GREEN FUTURE

With the imminent legalization of marijuana for recreational use and 
increasing demand for medicinal cannabis, commercial grower Tweed is 
more than doubling its production space in Smiths Falls - and its 
sister company Tweed Farms has been approved to sell product through 
its Niagra-On-The-Lake location.

Bruce Linton, chief executive of Canopy Growth Corp., a $260-million 
publicly traded company with Tweed, Tweed Farms Inc. and Bedrocan 
under its umbrella, called the company's new licence a "major 
milestone" that gives it the green light to produce medical marijuana 
in what might be - at 350,000 square feet - Canada's largest greenhouse.

All three brands are licensed suppliers under Health Canada's 
Marihuana for Medical Purposes Regulations (MMPR) program, which 
provides Canadians with pharmaceutical grade cannabis.

"We acquired the greenhouse 22 months ago to position ourselves as a 
large scale, low-cost producer capable of supplying a sizable 
percentage of the market," Linton said in a news release.

Meanwhile momentum continues to build at Tweed's sprawling campus in 
the former Hershey chocolate factory in Smiths Falls that closed in 2008.

Though it's a stone's throw from the town's police station across the 
street, the 168,000-square-foot building is secure, with swipe cards 
required for every door, a super-sized walk-in bank vault that stores 
up to $150 million worth of product, and at least 150 cameras 
covering every grow room, cubicle and hallway.

Inside the plant, which is not open to the public, the space 
resembles a high-tech research lab. Grow technicians in protective 
gear work in sterile, temperature, odour and light-controlled 
"flowering rooms", with rows of vibrant green plants of various 
strains and maturity. And given the Supreme Court of Canada ruled 
last summer to allow authorized medicinal cannabis users to use 
extracts and derivatives of cannabis, Tweed is now producing and 
selling cannabis oil products and edibles.

Up to 18 more grow rooms will be built over the next year or so, in a 
large vacant space resembling an aircraft hangar, bringing the number 
from 12 to 30, depending on market demand.

"We are definitely accelerating it because we think that there are 
pretty clear signs that we are going to have a non-medical market," 
said communications manager Jordan Sinclair. "But I think that we 
would have got there regardless ... it's starting to look like people 
are learning more about (medical cannabis), more doctors are learning 
more about it, more doctors are prescribing, and more people are 
curious about it."

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has promised to legalize, tax and 
regulate marijuana, many people keeping a close eye on Canada's new 
policy-in-the-making, including notorious rapper and cannabis 
connoisseur Snoop Dogg, who wants to tap into what could possibly 
turn into a $5-billion industry.

The singer sent his people to scope out the Tweed site and in 
February entered into a partnership to give Tweed exclusive rights to 
use brands owned by his company, LBC Holdings.

Tweed, which opened in 2014 and now employs about 120 people from the 
Smiths Falls area, is licensed to produce 3,500 kilograms of medical 
cannabis a year.
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom