Special security for cannabis cultivators

A stipulated type of security system will be required for all cultivators of cannabis being produced for medical purposes in Barbados.

This announcement was made Sunday night by the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Barbados Medicinal Cannabis Authority (BMCA) Shantal Munro-Knight while addressing a Christ Church East Central community meeting of the Barbados Labour Party (BLP).

Munro-Knight said participants in the medicinal marijuana industry would only be able to hire a security firm already licensed under the Barbados regime.

“Every single licensee will have to have security, regardless of if they are doing a one-acre, two-acre, three-acre, small plot, big plot, it doesn’t matter. They must have security… different levels of security…security cameras… some of them. If you are talking about that four acres, which is a vast tract of land, we are going to record them to ensure they have manned security. We actually have specifications in terms of the camera pixels. They have to have lighting, some of them will need dogs,” she explained.

Munro-Knight also assured Barbadians and residents that the sector would be strictly regulated and monitored in order to ensure the safety of the medicines which are being made available to those patients who use them.

She said that was why the authority would be issuing eight different licences – for cultivation, processing, transportation of the products, importation of raw materials such as seeds and tissue culture, export licences, research and development, retail and distribution, and laboratory.

“Because it is a drug, there are standards that we have to be able to make sure that we are aligned to, to ensure the safety of the drug.
So, we have to make sure that we work with the Ministry of Health. We have to make sure that the standards under which the cultivation is done, under which the processing is done for the extraction of the medicines, comply with all of the best practices,” the CEO told her audience.

Munro-Knight also informed that while certain other jurisdictions involved in the medicinal cannabis industry have additional annual costs along with their licence fees, Barbadians would not have to pay such costs because they are built into the one-time licence fee that covers five years. (EJ)