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‘Even at height of pandemic, investors take risk in marijuana industry’
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Posted on Mar 11 2022
Even during the height of COVID-19 pandemic in September 2020, the CNMI Cannabis Commission saw people willing to take the risk in investing in the marijuana industry, according to CCC managing director Monique Sablan.
In her presentation before the House of Representatives Commission on Cannabis Tuesday, Sablan the marijuana industry opened in August 2020 when the online portal for commercial and non-commercial license applications was opened. Just a month later, in September 2020, they received about nine to 10 applications, she said, which Sablan found very interesting because the CNMI was at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic at the time.
She said from September 2020 all the way to 2021, they received applications for a marijuana producer license, marijuana wholesaler, marijuana processor, marijuana retailer, and marijuana lounge. She said with the five different production licenses that were issued within the last year, a total of 17 jobs—three part-time and 14 full-time—were created. Sablan said these are jobs range from owner to head grower, grower assistant, production manager, farm assist, farmer, and others.
Some have overlapping positions, such as the owner who acts as grower or the head grower. “But almost always they have a secondary employee, either a farm assistant or growing assistant. But for the rest of them, they’re really new jobs that have been created,” she said.
Sablan said there are three retailers that have a total of 15 job positions—12 part-time and three full-time.
As more applicants continue to be licensed, that will translate to more jobs, she said.
“Remember that there’s so many variations and sizes. Some people want to have a small retail shop, some people want to open up a larger retail shop. Some people want to be producer class 3 versus micro producer,” she said.
She said the Business Gross Revenue reported per month from a combination of all the licenses range from $81,464 in July 2021 all the way up to $171,978 in December 2021.
“We’ve only really seen the industry grow…since July [2021],” Sablan said, adding that this is only six months worth of information and data. \
