CANNABIS: DISRUPTIVE INNOVATION softened, further illustrating that as this
For the uninitiated, hemp and marijuana refer to the same species of plant, Cannabis sativa . In the United States, marijuana is defined as any Cannabis sativa plant that has greater than 0.3% THC, or tetrahydrocannabinol, the primary psychoactive compound in cannabis (the stuff that gets you high). Hemp plants are defined as any cannabis plant that has 0.3% or less THC. You can think of it as marijuana and hemp having a common pool of genetic variations. The 2018 Farm Bill changed federal policy regarding hemp, including the removal of hemp from the Controlled Substances Act and the consideration of hemp as an agricultural product. But it was not until January 2021 that the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced its final federal regulations for hemp. And it has not been without widespread criticism from business and state lawmakers. Some of these final measures have been
nascent industry continues to evolve within the guardrails and legal framework it’s being given, there is still more to learn about the plant. So how is it that it took until 2018 for a Farm Bill to describe hemp as an agricultural product? One of my partners at cannabis consulting firm Supercritical, Sparky Rose, rightly posits that 25 years from now, America will ask itself an honest question: “What the hell were we thinking with cannabis prohibition?” Much has been written about the vast social disruption that occurred under Harry Anslinger and how he almost single-handedly created the campaign against cannabis as head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, a role he held from 1930 until 1962. Concern about the rising use of marijuana and research linking its use with crime and other social problems created pressure on the federal government to act. Rather than promoting federal legislation, the Federal
COMMODITY A basic physical asset used in commerce that is interchangeable with other goods of the same type. Commodities are most often used as inputs in the production of other goods or services. The quality of a given commodity may differ slightly, but it is essentially uniform across producers. DISRUPTIVE INNOVATION A process by which a product or service initially takes root in simple applications at the bottom of a market and generally is less expensive and more accessible. Acceptance drives the moves upmarket, eventually displacing established competitors. Disruptive innovations are NOT breakthrough technologies that make good products better – rather they are innovations that make products and services more accessible and affordable, thereby making them available to a larger population.
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June 2021
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