 AS WE ALL KNOW, the medicinal and recreational cannabis industry is one that is fast developing across the whole world, with Canada aiming for recreational legalization later in 2018. Anyone doing a little bit of research will see that while cannabis access has improved over the last decade in Canada through the Government medical licensing programs or with upcoming legalization for recreational use, the Government have always made every attempt to control its production, distribution and profits, continually arresting individuals and raiding dispensaries across the country. Despite BC having an effective private dispensary model, Provinces are now in talks of setting up a whole new standard for distribution where the Government and liquor boards can get the pieces of the pie.
A membership driven cooperative, the National lndigenous Medical Cannabis Association (NIMCA) is a non-profit corporation developed by lndigenous peoples, for lndigenous peoples. Established in January 2017, NIMCA’s purpose is to educate, promote, advocate and defend the interests and rights of lndigenous people, communities and businesses involved or wishing to be involved in the cannabis industry throughout Canada and its Treaty territories. NIMCA also represents a growing network of cannabis and hemp growers and farmers, hemp processors and manufacturers, dispensary owners and other cannabis industry related operations, with 21 businesses currently on board. Now, as the U.N. Declaration on the rights of Indigenous Peoples states, Indigenous peoples have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their cultural heritage, traditional knowledge and traditional cultural expressions, as well as the manifestations of their sciences, technologies and cultures, including human and genetic resources, seeds, medicines, knowledge of the properties of fauna and flor oral traditions, literatures, designs, sports and traditional games and visual and performing arts. They also have the right to maintain, control, protect and develop their intellectual property over such cultural heritage, traditional knowledge, and traditional cultural expressions. Arguably, there is more traditional and historical knowledge and use of the hemp and cannabis plant within Indigenous or First Nation communities than in common colonial society, and given the increasing value of hemp and cannabis in the current emerging global market, it is of utmost importance we protect not only what is a vital part of our cultural history, but a highly valuable asset that can allow our communities to thrive in this booming economy, while potentially strengthening our negotiating power when dealing with Government. But as Natives know all too well (in any country), many of our rights and resources get unfairly taken away from us by those ultimately in positions of power. Currently, each Province is setting their own regulations for the legalization of recreational cannabis, and when looking at current regulations for medicinal cannabis production and distribution, or even proposed regulations within a recreational context, one thing is for certain… very few privileges are being given to the private market, with strict regulations and extremely high penalties for infractions. NIMCA has a vision to standardize the legal cannabis industry within Indigenous cannabis communities not only in philosophy and education, but in true practice with a safe and fully traceable production and distribution model that is up to Government standard (and higher!). In doing so, it offers the Government no reason to interfere. Instead, NIMCA plans to develop a model so effective, it allows for lucrative business relationships to be developed between the Indigenous people and Canada, as well as with the global cannabis market. NIMCA currently boasts a facility that rivals those of current Canadian cannabis Licensed Producers and makes every effort to follow all their proposed facility, security and production procedures. In accordance with their vision to create a fully traceable system for their community, NIMCA works with only a select few designated medical cannabis growers and own a commercial facility that offers every service under one roof that any cannabis-related business could ever possibly need. In an effort to ensure Government standards or higher, the facility was set up following similar guidelines set out by the Canadian government for legal Licensed Producers, while also creating departments for quality concentrate production, edible production, and even on-site testing. With access to these services, NIMCA offers Indigenous communities the ability to create a standardized and safe cannabis industry to thrive in and self-regulate. Their facility is already prepared for the expansion of cannabis access options for the public and houses a food-grade kitchen for creating commercial-grade quality edibles, a cannabis extraction department capable of making several kinds of concentrates, an inventory warehouse for smoking accessories and apparel, a packaging department with professional grade packaging and labeling equipment, a highly secure vault for safe cannabis storage, on-site security and surveillance, and even a fully equipped lab department capable of doing on-site batch testing of products! NIMCA also plans to develop a cooperative growing project allowing the cultivation of cannabis and hemp plants in one secure and regulated location in order to further ensure traceability and standardization across all Indigenous cannabis businesses, keeping the industry out of the hands of criminals and the black market. With NIMCA’s model, any cannabis business that is part of the organization will be able to provide records that track every product from seed to sale, which will support a thriving and protected Indigenous cannabis market, and using this healing plant to restore, revitalize and heal native communities across Canada by securing their place within the emerging cannabis market.
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 Hello fellow tokers, Have you ever heard of kief? It's that dusty stuff that collects at the bottom of your weed grinder that most people tend to ignore or throw out when that grinder starts getting stuck. To be more specific, "kief" is made up mostly of the broken trichomes and plant debris that fall off the cannabis buds and leaves, which some could call the first ever solventless concentrate of cannabis! The technical term is called, "Dry-sift extraction".  "Trichomes" are the tiny, sticky stalks or "crystals" on your cannabis buds and leaves that contain a high amount of THC (the cannabis compound responsible for the psychoactive high), and it's this fine powder that infamous Moroccan hashish is made with, using a process of beating the buds over a tightly bound screen. So no, do not throw out that powder that collects on the edges of your grinder!  What many cannabis smokers don't know is that kief not only comes from buds, but also from leftover stems and shake that many would otherwise throw away, and there are some easier methods to collect it aside from using your grinder. In this article, we're going to show you how you can still make good use of your stems and leftover shake, and the many things you can do with your kief!  Many years ago, I came across a cannabis accessory called the "Pollen Shaker", and it's probably one of the most valued cannabis accessories I have ever owned. It's lasted me so many years, it's fool-proof to use and it's blessed me with the opportunity to toke when there were days I had no cannabis left at all. The "Pollen Shaker" is essentially a handheld aluminium or PVC tube that can be opened from both ends and has a fine screen built-in halfway inside. Used as a handheld kief shaker, one can put their ground up buds, trim and shake into one end, freeze the tube for 20minutes (rendering the trichomes on the cannabis brittle and easily breakable), and with a good 5 minute shake produce a sizeable mound of powdery kief on the other side. This process can be repeated a couple times until you notice that the powder becomes more green in colour as more plant material (and less trichomes) starts passing through the fine screen mesh. This not only makes your kief less potent and pure, but the flavour also becomes far more plant-like when smoked.  There are quite a few kief-makers on the market that typically tend to be more tray-like in fashion, making them too bulky to freeze in a common freezer and makes it difficult to efficiently shake the kief from the cannabis. The "Pollen Shaker" on the other hand, can be shaken vigorously and is far more efficient as a kief separator than the alternatives. The amazing thing is that we often underestimate how much kief we can actually produce from the weed stems we would typically throw away! Start collecting your stems, and after a few joints, you could have enough stems to collect a gram of high quality kief! Now, did I mention that Kief can sometimes be as high as 60% in THC? Not bad for some stems and leafy shake! So what can we do with this kief? Well, there are a number of ways we can make use of this powdery gold:
When I was once a budtender, I was fortunate enough to keep all the stems and floor buds (yes, buds that fell on the floor, lol) at the end of every day. After accumulating bags of the stuff over a few months, I collected enough kief to fill my largest tupperware tub in my home. I would bong this with a few flakes of weed (to help it burn) and essentially toked free for almost a year! So now that you know a little more about kief, what are you going to do with it? |
