China Joins the Cannabis Game

According to a study conducted by the World Health Organization 2.5 percent of the Earth’s population, nearly 147 million people, smoke cannabis for health and recreation. As countries and states around the world continue to legalize it, this number increases. In America, places like Colorado and Washington have opened the doors to the big business of cannabis. Down in South America, Uruguay has legalized it, and Peru will soon follow suit. Now another country, with a population of an estimated 1.3 billion people, is taking the great leap forward to profit from the plant . . . China.

As altruistic as the legalization movement has been, only a moron would argue that massive money is not being made by cannabis. In Colorado, sales are at $996 million in just 2015. In Washington , tax profits from cannabis are at $70 million. California is expecting to take in nearly $1 billion, annually, and cannabis hasn’t even been legalized on a federal level throughout the U.S.A., yet. Technically, it is still a federal offence to cultivate, possess or use cannabis. The profits, however, cannot be ignored.

America is obviously cashing in on this business venture, and many companies are scurrying to profit from what they consider to be the next Big Tobacco. China is following suit. Groups like the World Intellectual Property Organization already report that companies in China have already filed 309 patents related to cannabis. With American companies like MediSwipe Inc. trading stock soaring by 70 percent, Chinese companies want a piece of the profit pie, too.

“Because cannabis in Western medicine is becoming accepted, the predominance of Chinese patents suggests that pharmaceutical sciences are evolving quickly in China, outpacing Western capabilities.”

Ancient China was not ignorant of the healing benefits of cannabis. Ever since the Emperor Shen Nung, in the 28th century B.C.E. encouraged the people to cultivate hemp to make cloth.  It has been a folk medicine there for dynasties. Even now, throughout the vast continent, there are thousands of acres of wild hemp, growing out in the open for traditional herbal medicine specialists to prescribe to people for a list of ailments including nausea, chronic pain, Multiple Sclerosis, epilepsy and insomnia. Archaeologists uncovered a cache of cannabis buried in a tomb in a remote part of China and deduced that it was grown for psychoactive, recreational purposes.

The past is now the present, and one Chinese company, Yunan Industrial Cannabis Sativa Co., is working on rendering hemp seeds into a food that bolsters the immune system. One inventor named Zhang Hongqi is working on an extract based on cannabis that treats peptic ulcers without negative side effects. Another patent has been filed by a major Chinese medical firm that cures constipation is comprised of cannabis and oranges, but is based on a traditional holistic medical recipe.

Major economic leaders agree that if China cashes in on cannabis, the potential profit would make America miniscule by comparison. Peter Reynolds, who leads the Cannabis Law Reform group, claims China is already the world leader in naturally growing hemp. “The Chinese are smarter and they are on to all good ideas,” he said. “The potential for cannabis as a medicine is monumental.”

Dr. Luc Duchesne, an expert from Ottawa who is both a businessman and a biochemist, commented to possible investors that, “Because cannabis in Western medicine is becoming accepted, the predominance of Chinese patents suggests that pharmaceutical sciences are evolving quickly in China, outpacing Western capabilities.” He concluded with a dire warning to investors that time is running out for America. “Chinese traditional medicine is poised to take advantage of a growing trend. The writing is on the wall: Westernized Chinese traditional medicine is coming to a dispensary near you.”