PHUKET: The Phuket Cannabis Association is calling for support to stave off any prospect of cannabis becoming recriminalised under the coalition formed by the leading Move Forward Party.
To show their support, people are urged to sign an online petition organised by cannabis association Weed in Thailand, which represents more than 4,800 licensed cannabis operators in the country.
As of yesterday (May 26), the petition had 5,525 signatures, comprising 3,591 citizens, 310 farms, 191 companies, 838 expats and 595 tourists. The deadline for signing the online petition is this coming Wednesday (May 31).
“The signatures to the petition will be collected from throughout Thailand. They will be printed out and handed to a lawyer, who has been fighting for the legalisation of cannabis for 10 years, to present them to the new Minister of Health,” explained Poonwarit ‘Thames’ Wangpatravanich, President of the Phuket Cannabis Association.
“This is not just important for Phuket, but important for Thailand as a whole,” Mr Poonwarit said.
Mr Poonwarit believes cannabis becoming fully criminalised again is growing less likely. “We understand that it is just a political play. I don’t believe that it will be fully criminalised again,” he said.
“What it will be is a more structured, more regulated industry, which is good for the industry as a whole. It will be more sustainable because want anything too much or too little ‒ there needs to be a balance,” he said.
“For us to be more regulated would be the best thing that can happen to us,” Mr Poonwarit noted.
“Even though Kao Klai Party [Move Forward] said they want to criminalise it, it sounds like what Bhumjaithai wants to do with the Cannabis Act. From this direction alone it seems like there is nothing to really worry about because it will not be back to fully criminalised, but what I think it will be is that people who do not follow the rules would be subject to criminal legal action.
“I think that is a good thing, and not necessarily a bad thing, because it will only affect people who do business without licence, people who do business with underage kids and pregnant women, people who sell import weed, which is destroying the market here in Thailand, and of course people who import illegal weed,” he explained.
“So these things need to be controlled,” he agreed.
“So if that is the case, why do we need the petition?” he posed. “I believe that we need to be prepared. So we hope for the best, but prepare for the worst. If that comes, then we have a full arsenal in our hands [to counter the recriminalisation],” he added.
“If cannabis is criminalised again, then we will have thousands of people in support of us. We also already have a ‘Cannabis Act’ drafted by the people,” he said.
“We need to get ourselves ready for whatever situation that may come, and once we have this we will be confident, we will be calm, we will be at peace and we can continue with our lives and our business,” he added.
PROLIFERATION
“Phuket is already the capital city of cannabis in Asia,” Mr Poonwarit said with full confidence.
“The value and the volume of what is sold here legally ‒ and illegally ‒ is most impressive,” he said.
There are more than 1,300 licensed operators in Phuket. “From what I am aware, we already have 7,200 shops [in Phuket] already open,” Mr Poonwarit noted.
“Already in Thailand we have over 10,000 operators who have applied or already been issued a licence,” he added.
ECONOMIC IMPACT
“For Phuket, cannabis is highly important,” Mr Poonwarit noted. Even if each operator sold just one gramme of cannabis a day ‒ the smallest baseline he could think of ‒ the economic benefit to Phuket would still be of high importance, he said.
According to the University of the Thai Chamber of Commerce, the cannabis industry in Thailand is expected to be worth US$1 billion by 2025.
“Phuket is already a tourism city. If we can increase our GDP by 5-10% with a new segment of cannabis tourism, why not? We have the infrastructure, much better than Amsterdam, where its cold and it is wet and does not have as many places to stay. In Phuket we have a tropical climate and more than 10,000 keys, or units, where visitors can stay,” he said.
“Phuket has a strong competitive advantage compared with other locations around the world regarding the cannabis industry,” he said.
“Right now what we have is just the minimum. We can do more ‒ way more ‒ if we do it right. And we can move in more dimensions, not just the dispensaries, but also on the medical side in terms of cannabis medical tourism,” he said.
“Right now we don’t even have a cannabis-themed hotel or a cannabis-friendly hotel that is pushing this, but if we do that, it will be another level ‒ and of course the cannabis industry here in Thailand has the biggest advantage [compared with its competitors],” he added.
The rapid growth of the cannabis industry has presented its own problems, not just in terms of regulations, Mr Poonwarit noted.
“For this new industry we will need much more human resources to make this work. Right now we are in a supply shortage of human resources to work in cannabis-related businesses already
“We want to be able to train them to be able to compete with international standards in the cannabis industry,” he said.
LOOKING FORWARD
The Phuket Cannabis Association will be holding a meeting this coming Thursday (June 1), Mr Poonwarit explained.
“We are calling for people in the cannabis business in Phuket to come and discuss these points: the politics, potential new regulations, the illegal import stuff, and foreigners doing business here,” he said.
“These are the problems that people are having. We hope that this event will help them feel more at ease and we will collect this data for further action,” he said.
For details of the meeting on Thursday, visit the Phuket Cannabis Association official Facebook page (click here).
To sign the online petition, click here.
