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Last Thursday, Jamen Shively, a former corporate strategy manager of Microsoft, announced his plans to develop the first national brand of marijuana. Shivley told reporters that he was seeking about only $10 million for his start-up venture.
With Shivley planning to organize a national chain and national brand of marijuana comes the question of regular supply, and Shivley believes in importing top grade weed from Mexico.
Former Mexican President Vincente Fox supported him up with his vision of decriminalizing marijuana. However, Fox emphasized that he had no financial stake in Shivley’s plans. What Fox stressed was about the “difference it makes to have Jamen here sitting at my side instead of Chapo Guzman.”
Guzman is the Mexican drug lord credited with smuggling billions of dollars worth of marijuana across the border.
Referring to the last U.N. report (2005) of a global trade valued at $142 billion, Shivley said, “It’s a giant market in search of a brand … We would be happy if we get 40 percent of it worldwide.”
Shivley said at the press conference that he has acquired rights to the Northwest Patient Resource Center, a medical marijuana operation with two Seattle store fronts. He said that talks were on to acquire another dispensary in Colorado and one each in Washington and California.
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The former Microsoft manager was convinced that he had “created the first risk-mitigated vehicles for investing directly in this business opportunity.”
However, people remain skeptic as cannabis still remains a forbidden drug under federal laws. At the same time many states like Colorado are passing new laws to control the business of production and sale of marijuana.
Colorado for instance has passed laws where anyone who wants to invest in the marijuana industry would have to prove a two-year residency in the state.
Colorado as well as other states have emphasized that while they have legalized marijuana, they want the production, as well as sales to be confined within their respective states – something that conflicts with Shivley’s high vision of importing wholesale from Mexico and selling it across the nation.
Illinois has already stated specifically that marijuana sold within the state will have to be produced within the state.
And of course the question of quality remains. If and whenever mass production of marijuana is allowed within the United States, there are regions aplenty with suitable weather and soil conditions where much higher quality marijuana, than what Mexico can ever produce, could be grown readily and legally.
So, the legal alternative to Chapo Guzman still seems farfetched.
