Zimbabwe Announces Rules For Cultivating Cannabis

The legal cannabis industry is emerging all over the planet right now, and that includes spreading across the African continent. An increasing number of countries in Africa are getting on the right side of history and allowing the legal cannabis industry to operate.

One of those countries is Zimbabwe. Zimbabwe may not be the first country that a person thinks of when they think of cannabis reform and the emerging cannabis industry, however, the country is in the midst of a cannabis policy transformation.

Officials in Zimbabwe recently announced the rules that will govern cannabis production within Zimbabwe’s borders, along with rules pertaining to cannabis research. Per Bloomberg:

Anxious Masuka, the agriculture minister, under regulations published in a government gazette said three types of permits can be issued for growers, researchers and industrial hemp merchants.

Growers are only allowed to cultivate, market and sell industrial hemp and researchers may cultivate for research purposes. A merchant can contract individual farmers, procure and process industrial hemp into a specified product.

Zimbabwe’s current law only allows for the legal cultivation of hemp and not higher-THC varieties of cannabis. Hopefully as time goes by that restriction is lifted and all types of cannabis will be allowed to be legally cultivated.

For now, the rules that were announced will have to do, and it’s worth noting that they are far superior to prohibition. Historically, the cultivation of cannabis carried a prison sentence of up to 12 years.