A message from Executive Director – Andrew Mullins:
Next week MoCannTrade Board Chair – Dena Ladd and I will be traveling to Washington D.C. to meet with our congressional delegation and other policymakers about Missouri’s medical cannabis program. As many of you know, our board and staff are called upon regularly to participate in various conversations with other states, policymakers, trade associations and community forums where we are regularly asked to give updates about Missouri’s program. Both Missourians who aren’t as familiar with the program and other states and industry associations hoping to learn best practices come away impressed when we tell the Missouri story.
Below we wanted to share that latest update with you, so that when you are talking to patients, business partners or community members, you can help spread the message about how Missouri is becoming one of the best medical marijuana programs in the country.
Missouri September 2022 update:
First and foremost, Missouri’s medical marijuana program is currently providing lab tested, regulated, medical cannabis to over 200,000 Missouri patients and caregivers who can access this medicine safely in their own communities, with new patients being added every week. Our members hear stories every single day from Missouri patients that talk about the health improvements they are experiencing thanks to our regulated program. From kicking opioid addictions to helping with chronic pain, Missouri’s medical cannabis program is helping the lives of everyday patients in every corner of our state.
In less than two years, the Missouri medical marijuana program has generated more than $459 million in cumulative retail sales and about $14 million in new revenues deposited into the Missouri Veterans’ Fund, without a single penny of Missouri taxpayers’ general revenue dollars going to help Missouri’s Department of Health and Senior Services operate the program.
Besides just the health benefits, Missouri’s economy is also reaping the rewards from this successful program. The creation of this brand-new industry has already generated an estimated $1.2 billion (with a B) in direct spending to build or retrofit the nearly 400 new small businesses / medical marijuana facilities geographically dispersed in every corner of Missouri.
Presently, monthly medical cannabis sales exceed $30 million, with 4% of that allocated for veterans’ care. The program has generated more than 9,200 new industry jobs to date and accounted for an astonishing 1 out of every 10 new jobs created in Missouri in 2021.
Missouri warehouses and industrial sites that sat empty for decades are now housing state-of-the-art cultivation facilities. Long abandoned retail locations are now filled with dispensary employees that are knowledgeably helping their own neighbors replace opioids with safe, responsible medical marijuana for chronic pain and other ailments. Manufacturing jobs and plants that were lost overseas, are now being replaced by infused product manufacturers that are turning Missouri-grown cannabis into edibles, tinctures, vapes and topicals giving patients a variety of medical cannabis forms at affordable prices because of Missouri’s low cannabis tax rate (4%).
The economic benefits from medical marijuana in Missouri are helping to backfill manufacturing, agricultural and industrial jobs previously lost in Missouri cities both big and small. From St. Louis City, Springfield and the urban core of Kansas City to Carrollton, Waynesville, Chaffee, Vienna, Humansville, Macon, Cuba and more … the jobs, investments, and revenues being produced as part of this program are rejuvenating local economies.
But none of this happens without taking care of patients. And that’s exactly what we have been doing since the first legal sale of medical cannabis in MO nearly 2 years ago to today and beyond as we continue to collaborate on building the best medical marijuana program in the entire country.
Thank you for playing your part to get us here. We will do our best to represent our collective efforts as well as the exciting changes and impact our medical cannabis program has provided to Missourians, Missouri patients, businesses and communities while in D.C.!
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