If you have remained underground this long, you are right to probably stay there where you can ride out the coming change. Sorry to hear about the C, and congrats on the first 4 of many more.
FTCG, might be stronger than I believe, but not registering your guns, I thought, was the most patriotic thing any Canadian could do, is growing your own medicine under duress from your government patriotic, why not?
I sleep with a commercial grower, lol, and he points to all other plants and says that mass production will always be able to sell for less then small farms, it is hard to argue with him, just look around, 1 gal shrubs for $5 bucks a piece, even where I live in (Timbucktwo). Even in my own garden I have troubles beating the store in season, never mind getting paid for labour too.
It is important to realize that the red tape for LP's is the same as for tomato growers, except for security requirements and zoning, in fact laxer in some regards. No special taxes for medical marihuana.
Mass production alone will bring the prices down in a medical market, add to that the savings and reduced risk from being legal, among other inherent advantages like open competition, the MMPR will reduce the price of marihuana, how long will it take is the real question. Legalization for recreational use will start the government grabs for taxes from marihuana, but they know that killing the illicit pot market before we tax the crap out of it is important too, like alcohol. Many hope your right about the survival of the small grower but I believe the writing is on the wall, we are just waiting for the fat lady to sing. You will be growing for purely pleasure and/or protest because the quality and price will be better on line. Give it a few years. stirring the pot
Thanks, I say they won't take me either up above or down below, so they keep throwing me back here, I'm not arguing with them
Lol, stir the pot, good for you, most of my friends are pot stirrers, much more fun to have challenging conversation than go with the flow
Can't argue with the economics of large scale grows, but at the same time, I believe that at least short-term, with the government's involvement, it will take a long time to become economically viable, productive, and profitable. The big if is whether this program ever gets off the ground (challenges are already under way) and even then I'd bet on changes, whether its this current conservative or any following government, there will be changes. In the meantime, many will suffer and be potentially prosecuted because they trusted some government program a few years ago, now they're on "the list" and easy targets. Sit back under the radar for a while folks, this advice goes south of the border too people, many states are going on their own, against federal wishes/laws. Look at one of the (many) problems they're running into where the banks won't accept "dirty" grower money, because they (banks) are controlled by the feds, so its technically illegal for them to accept/deposit/exchange money from growers, ouch
Also remember that getting on a "list" is easy, getting off that list can be next to impossible, if things change/go wrong, you're screwed.
Besides all of this, you're right, I do take comfort in knowing what I put into my grow and resulting end products (smoke, oil, hash, baking, teas), and it's a hobby/addiction, not addicted to the pot, just addicted to perfecting the grow, which as we all know is not possible as there's always room for improvement
People still grow their own vegetable gardens (moi), even though they can buy cheaper, mass produced, nice looking, genetically modified foods - lol
I'm betting on dying of natural causes before this ever gets sorted out. In the meantime I'll be dammed if I allow any government to tell me what I can or cannot do to get my meds...