Cannoperations, a wholly owned subsidiary of Cann Group Ltd., has become the first company to be granted a license to produce and cultivate medical cannabis for manufacture in Australia.

The Office of Drug Control, the country’s medical cannabis regulator, made the announcement on March 8, just weeks after the office granted Cann Group a license to grow cannabis for medical research purposes.

While licenses have been issued to state governments, these are the first granted to a commercial entity. Cann Group has not announced whether it has also applied for a manufacturing license or whether the company will provide cannabis to other manufacturers.

Weed was always something Ilene Cohn knew her children did. But until recently she had never thought to partake.

"You know we never thought of it for ourselves – we knew our kids were using it," Cohn said."(Village Concepts) offered this trip to us, and we thought it was very exciting. We've gotten little bits of information, enough to whet our appetite to hear more and see more."

Geoff Whaling wants to grow marijuana in an underground bunker in Pennsylvania that was built to survive nuclear attacks. 

It's not because, as you might assume, he is concerned the DEA might break through the door a Whaling is one of several hundred hopefuls who are seeking to grow medical marijuana legally in Pennsylvania starting next year a but because the bunker provides a number of other benefits: it is secure, the temperature is steady and the humidity and other environmental factors can be easily regulated.

Also, it's a bunker.

Can a worker be fired or denied a job for using medical marijuana?

At the same time as Massachusetts' highest court is considering the question, state lawmakers will also be debating whether to pass a new law to protect medical marijuana patients at work.

"Those protections are still not there, and our leaders need to recognize it and do something about it," said Nichole Snow, executive director of the Massachusetts Patient Advocacy Alliance, which advocates on behalf of medical marijuana patients. "We're still dealing with the stigma of using medical marijuana as a treatment plan for severe illness in the state of Massachusetts."

The marijuana industry is picking up as legalization sweeps the country, but there are still some wrinkles to be ironed out.

In particular, most banks won't deal with weed businesses, which means they can't take credit cards.

That means buyers have to carry cash, and sellers end up with huge amounts of cash on hand — some dispensaries in Denver can do sales of $500,000 per month. Transacting in cash increases the risk of theft, and if the sellers try to deposit large amounts of cash at the bank, they can be suspected of money laundering or other crimes.

But one company thinks it's found a way to keep both banks and legal weed businesses happy.

More stoned workers will be showing up in Canada's workplaces with the coming legalization of marijuana, but companies have few tools to cope with potential safety risks.

That's the message from some employers, who say they've received no assurances from Ottawa so far that the new pot regime will include workplace safeguards.

"We're caught in a potential Catch 22: how do you protect the worker and those around them as well as deal with legalized marijuana?" said Cameron MacGillivray, president of Enform, a Calgary-based oil-and-gas safety group.

"It is a pressing concern for the industry because of the … potential catastrophic impacts of somebody doing a critical safety job when they're impaired."

Tiller, Oregon is an idyllic riverside town. It’s bordered by national parks, with abundant resources and enough infrastructure to support a handful of residents. It also happens to be for sale, and while it will most likely be turned into a housing development of some sort - the 256-acre plot of multi-use land is also getting plentiful interest from the cannabis industry.

After prohibiting medical marijuana for more than two decades, the Southern California town of La Mesa has recently become the site of an unexpected cannabis boom.

In November, the San Diego suburb passed a ballot initiative, Measure U, allowing medical marijuana dispensaries, cultivation centers, and manufacturing sites within city limits. In doing so, it lifted a ban that had been in place since the passage of California’s first statewide medical cannabis law in 1996. La Mesa (pop. 57,065) became the third city in San Diego County to welcome cannabis businesses. (Well, technically it tied for second—Lemon Grove, La Mesa’s neighbor to the south, also legalized dispensaries on Nov. 8.)

The granting of preliminary approvals to build farms comes just a week-and-a-half after the cabinet authorized a plan to decriminalize marijuana use by first-time offenders.

In a move they hope will revolutionize the medical-cannabis sector, 37 farmers received preliminary permits from the Health Ministry to construct facilities for the plant’s cultivation.

Skunkworx Packaging is releasing a new packaging product for cannabis that will revolutionize the industry. The company stated the top enemy to medical cannabis profit isn't the DEA, it's packaging.

A new product is helping local companies reduce losses and increase profits. Skunkworx states Polybags “Turkey Bags” are vital to the integrity of maintaining quality product, and in turn the profit. The professionals in this field know this fact. What separates one bag from the next? Many think they are all the same, but they are not. The crafty sales tactics of the vendors and lack of concern, or knowledge in quality control department is costing these product owners money.