SYRACUSE, N.Y. – Forget lucrative tax-free offers for new and expanding businesses.

What some companies really want to do in New York is grow and sell pot.

On Tuesday, the state announced that 43 companies have applied for just five spots to be sanctioned growers and distributors of medical marijuana in New York. During a six-week window, those companies filed copious paperwork and paid $10,000 a pop each for the opportunity to be considered as a legitimate New York marijuana manufacturer and distributor.

An Australian pharmaceutical company, the most recent "pot stock" to trade on the ASX, has become one of the first local players to be granted a license to grow marijuana for medicinal purposes. 

MGC Pharmaceuticals, which is operated out of Israel, will be allowed to grow, process, import and export cannabis from Slovenia, where the government has legalised the practice.

Fellow Australian cannabis producer, AusCann, secured permission to grow and export marijuana on Norfolk Island in May. The difference between the two producers is MGC hopes to produce a product for the cosmetic industry whereas AusCann is targetting pain relief. 

Colorado is leading again, this time with a permanent tax break on recreational marijuana. The state is lowering the tax from 10% to 8% effective in July 2017, a move that could cut into Colorado’s black market. Colorado was the first state to legalize marijuana for recreational use, and now it’s passed a marijuana tax relief. There is even a one-time tax holiday on September 16, 2015, from the 10% state sales tax.

If a prominent American law school has a “professorship for marijuana law and policy” sponsored by a successful law firm focusing primarily on cannabis law, why shouldn’t there be a weed-only bar association for said practicing attorneys?

It was only a matter of time, of course.

The National Cannabis Bar Association launches today with the goal of becoming “a specialty bar association dedicated to providing attorneys in the cannabis industry with educational and networking opportunities to help them better serve cannabis businesses,” according to a press release.

Jimi Hendrix is to be the face of a range of cannabis products, a Canadian company has announced – but they’re already being faced with a legal fight.

Nutritional High say they’ve cut a deal with Purple Haze Properties to use Hendrix’s name and likeness on edible items including “hemp oil infused gummy bears, heard candies and health and energy drinkables.”

Products are legal in 48 US state because they contain no HCT, a leading active element of cannabis. The firm aims to market packages using the names Purple Haze and Stone Free.

Purple Haze Properties is run by the iconic guitarist’s brother Leon. But Experience Hendrix, chaired by sister Janie, say he doesn’t have the rights to arrange the deal.

Public hearings begin Wednesday to help fine-tune Vancouver’s plans to regulate medical marijuana dispensaries – and shape a policy that one advocate says will be copied by cities across Canada.

Dana Larsen, director of the Vancouver Dispensary Society and operator of two dispensaries, noted the City of Victoria has already cited Vancouver as a model for policies it is developing as it grapples with the issue.

“A lot of smaller cities don’t have the resources to devote time and staff effort to analyzing this and figuring out what these rules should be,” Mr. Larsen said in an interview on Tuesday. “They’re going to copy whatever Vancouver does and tweak it a little bit for their own community.”

PBS NewsHour correspondent Spencer Michels inspects marijuana grower Casey O’Neill’s crop on a farm that uses rainwater. O’Neill is hoping pot will become legal and regulated in California.

Behind a gas station, just off the main highway that runs through Garberville, California, is a nursery that sells plants and seedlings. It’s called Wonderland, and by “plants and seedlings” it means cannabis. Its rooms and greenhouses are filled with a pungent array of marijuana plants that can be bought by people with a doctor-signed medical marijuana card. Then they can grow their own.

The openness of the business, in a state which has yet to legalize recreational marijuana, can be shocking to those used to the years of war against cannabis.

GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) - The Oregon Legislature is considering imposing up to a 20 percent sales tax on retail sales of marijuana once it becomes available to consumers.

Proposed amendments to a bill (HB 2041) allowing localities to prohibit marijuana facilities within 1,000 feet of schools would impose a 17 percent state tax on retail sales of marijuana products, from buds to candies.

Weed culture moved from the air to the airwaves in Colorado last week.

The first thing you notice after entering the Denver studios of “Smokin 94.1″ — Colorado’s first FM radio station devoted to marijuana enthusiasts, which debuted last week — is the lack of smell.

A giant bong and pot-themed posters decorate the offices, the music is in line with the brand (Bon Jovi’s “Blaze of Glory”), but the air is clean.

“It’s a non-smoking building,” said owner Marc Paskin, who doubles as DJ “Gary Ganja” during afternoon drive time. He’s additionally “O.G. Kush,” the announcer of the pot radio “4:20 News,” repeated at 5:20 p.m. “because our listeners can’t remember.”

When he was managing a 3,500-plant medical marijuana grow facility in Denver, Adam Koh would have his staff thoroughly inspect his crops several times a week for signs of infestation. Tiny bite marks on the cannabis leaves could mean two-spotted spider mites were piercing the plant’s skin and sucking up nutrients. Small piles of what looked like powdered sugar could be the beginning of a mildew incursion.