Growing cultivation of medical marijuana and exports will be bolstered by the New Democracy government keen to get the economy going after being driven down hard by the COVID-19 pandemic.A proposal presented by Development and Investments Minister Adonis Georgiadis at a cabinet meeting showed the cannabis would not be subject to the same laws as that sold domestically, which must follow the existing legislation calling for approval by the Hellenic Organization of Pharmaceuticals, said Kathimerini.
Exported products will be solely subject to the laws in the country importing them, the scheme at boosting production and exports, especially in view of increased interest by investors, the report added.It came after Kaya Holdings, the first U.S. publicly traded company to vertically integrate cannabis retail, cultivation, and processing, said its Greek venture named Dimitris Bouras the Lead Engineer, and his firm, Whitestone for the company’s planned operation in Thebes, said AccessWire.Kaya plans to build a 225,000-square foot cultivation site and 80,000-square feet of processing on 15 acres of land there, as companies have scrambled to get involved in Greece opening the market. "Greek Kannabis and our project, Kaya Kannabis, is lucky to have the loyal cooperation and deep knowledge base provided by Dimitris and his team at Whitestone,” said Kaya CEO Craig Frank.
"They have demonstrated their expertise in numerous projects in Greece and abroad - including cannabis projects", continued Frank, "and they are tried and true experts on the processes of cultivating cannabis, the processes extraction, the demands of logistics, the needs for security, and the requirements for EU-GMP Pharma grade standards - and manage to plan for maximum efficiencies,” he added.Keen interest in Greece's now-legal medical marijuana business with more than two dozen licenses approved could bring more than 100 million euros ($121.37 million) in capital investments, it was said in October 2019.That's for the initial creation of sites in northern Greece to grow and process what's called pharmaceutical cannabis products – marijuana – based on the number of licenses okayed by the economy and development ministry, said the business newspaper Naftemporiki then.