Calgary Herald recently reports that festival-goers can now consume legal cannabis while they enjoy the muic and event.
Specifically, live event fans will be able to order cannabis beverages, edibles, and other distilled pot products to be delivered to them in designated areas of festivals for the first time in Canada, said Nathan Mison, president of Diplomat Consulting.
Mison is a former cannabis retailer who believes the willingness of Alberta to engage in unique and beneficial conversations on this topic is a “big deal.”
Several months of discussions with Alberta's associate minister of red tape reduction led to the province’s approval of private pot retailers selling online and delivering purchases - a policy that took effect Tuesday (March 8th) - and to the change, Mison said.
This new change allows festivals and live events to offer fans a designated consumption area where products can be delivered and consumed alongside food and beverages, so long as alcohol is neither sold nor combined with them.
However, smokable cannabis remains excluded, which Mison hopes to continue to push for as a collective.
Although he expects consternation from the government, Mison seems to be optimistic about the gradual acceptance over time.
This may be due to the fact that, in 2019, the Calgary Folk Music Festival collaborated with Alberta Gaming, Liquor and Cannabis and city bylaw officials to provide a designated cannabis-smoking area at the festival site.
However, whether other festival officials - whose event was cancelled for the past two years due to the pandemic - will replicate that pilot project is still up in the air, as they would like to gauge its success before making a decision whether to emulate it.
A representative of the winter Block Heater Festival, Sara Leishman, says that this particular event is not the appropriate place, perhaps due to the two dormant years, to include that consideration into their planning cycle.
Moreover, he further stated that the past perceptions of marijuana among the public may be a barrier to certain decision-making processes in order to expand the cannabis tourism and hospitality sector.
However, he believes that within the next few years, we'll start seeing commercial developments like cannabis cafes and smorgasbords of culinary marijuana as we've witnessed in other places in North America.
But he said it’s only a matter of time before that mindset changes, and he expects to see cannabis cafes and a smorgasbord of culinary marijuana offerings in Alberta in the near future.
As a collective, when we truly understand that the advocates for marijuana trump the "against-movement," it is easy to understand why Mison said marijuana was such an "incredible opportunity" whether in terms of commercial development or investment.
Canadian entities like Aurora Cannabis (TSE:ACB), a publicly-traded company operating in Alberta, could benefit from this recent progress, and other cannabis companies like Canopy Growth (TSE:WEED) and Aphria (TSE:TLRY) with footprints in more places could gain as well once similar progress spreads across the globe.
Featured Image: Pixabay @ dariogerussi
