Thai Government May Source Medical Cannabis from Citizen Growers

A proposal for Thailand’s medical cannabis program would allow citizens to cultivate six cannabis plants and sell them back to the government who would process it for medical cannabis products, according to a Forbes report. Health Minister Anutin Charnvirakul said the reforms “allow the medical use of marijuana freely.”

“We have high confidence that marijuana will be among the major agricultural products for Thai households. We are speeding up the law changes. But there is a process to it.” – Charnvirakul, via Forbes

In September, the Chiang Rai Times reported that the government constructed Southeast Asia’s largest industrial-scale medical cannabis facility in Chiang Mai. The facility is reportedly currently cultivating 12,000 plants for the program. Chiang Mai is also home to Maejo University, which created a medical cannabis strain called “Issara” or “independence,” which contains equal percentages of THC and CBD, for use in the program.

Thailand’s Government Pharmaceutical Organization hopes to use the plants cultivated at the facility to make one million bottles of five-milliliter CBD oil by February 2020. So far, at least 13 hospitals have received licenses to dispense medical cannabis to patients.

Recreational cannabis use remains illegal in Thailand and those convicted of possession in the kingdom can be imprisoned.