Weirdly phrased title. The Canadian government has no role in throwing away product or setting the price, that falls on the businesses that manufacture and sell the weed.
It's probably got a lot to do with the market being relatively new. I imagine things will settle down in the coming years as producers gain real data to base demand estimates off of.
Also, I think initially some people were conflating support for legalization with actual demand. There are many people that support legalization who don't actually use the product.
Want to Chime in since there's a lot of weird misinformation and conjecture in the comments:
The over-production was a business decision by many of the producers. A bad one. But they knew they were producing more flower than the Canadian market needed at any price point. Dropping price down isn't going to dramatically increase the consumption as polling / research by stats can shows the people smoking todtay, are the same who were smoking illegally before, and that the overall Cannabis market (while huge) isn't something that was ballooning.
I had invested in numerous stocks in the industry back when legalization started to gain ground. As an investor and reading the reports, one thing was clear. Everyone of the biggest producers believed they were going to be international gods of pot and be able to sell world wide. Many hedged billions on producing enough flower for the American market with hopes that the US would follow along very shortly.
These poor business decisions led to the large producers, such as Canopy, and Aurora from making over-building production to the point that even if they shut several of their operations, they would still over-produce for the Canadian market.
at the end, this was some MBA deciding that profit margins would be higher by writing off the excess weed instead of spending additional resources to use it in other products (it still can be used for extracts and edibles even if low quality)
This is what happens when you create a new industry (Producers) and let it be run by the MBA's and giant businesses instead of those who are actually involved in the industry in the first place.
as soon as I saw these happening I sold out on their stocks. IOf you go look up these companies current valuations, they're almost worthless and worth pennies compared to when they started due to their horrific management. (Aurora Cannabis lost 1 Billion in a year)
Can one compost old weed? Turn it into weed mulch? Could someone buy it wholesale and make something else? This feels like a problem a little R and D could solve.
Sounds like the price is too high. Stupid fucking government. How dare you pride yourself on high prices. Are you not trying to disrupt the illegal trade? Why the fuck are you using their numbers, retards? GEE WHY ISNT ANYBODY BUYING OUR GREEDY FUCKING OUNCES and man, you should see the fucking website. Doug ford can go fuck himself with a forklift.
Try this amazing philosophy: if you can make that much, but can't sell that much, it's cuz it ain't worth that much not cuz nobody will buy it. Unless it's, you know, shit. AND FURTHERMORE, since clearly the government is going to read this, you might want to doublecheck that quality control isn't just taking the cheque and AFKing, cuz from this end that's how it looks!
Pot shop on every corner in Ontario. Shops are usually empty anytime I go in. Picking up whole ounces for $100. It was a scam run by the province to sell dispensary licenses because Doug Ford only knows how to run scams instead of doing good business based on good policy.
I've never used cannabis in my life, but last year I got a wild hair and decided to buy a gummy. It had no effect on me save for wanting to go to bed early, but I did my part y'all.
They fucked everything up. I know there were big issues with major gangs making money ect..... but no one seems to get that there were soooooooo many mom and pop operations making a little tax free money that went direct into the communities. They were buying quads , snowmobiles from local dealerships. Paying cash to local restaurants. There were people who couldn't find other jobs for reasons that could trim and grow to support themselves. It was a great industry for the lower to middle class to rise up without being screwed .
There are 20 sqdc in quebec. Trois-Rivieres, my hometown, has a single one which is +- 20 min away from my house while Montreal, which has 10x more people than my town has only 8 of them.
Im unsure about the black market in other town, but my coworker still grow 30-40 tree/yrs outside.
Why not collect and distribute this cannabis equally to various locales. Then, have a fucking "festival" everywhere and bring in local musicians and weed themed artists or product creators (bongs, pipes, etc) in a disposable (or properly cleanable preferably) semi-airtight "structure" and burn off the excess for everyone to enjoy.
Sell tickets, put the proceeds toward issues that taxes aren't quite covering, or put it towards hard drug treatment plans, etc?
Just a massive hotbox. Have outdoor areas for people to get some air, grab a beverage, snacks, etc? Gouge those prices too, a bit, like every other event under the sun.
My only suggestion is to keep it to mono-drug usage. In this case weed.
Alcohol and large crowds don't go well together, usually, and adding more substances to the mix makes things less controllable and predictable.