When I was 17 years old, I took a trip to Jamaica, courtesy of a friend’s extremely generous parents.
The rich kid, two other tagalongs, and I stayed at Montego Bay’s Half Moon Resort, in our own private villa right on the water.
You can see it in the photo below. It’s the front row, second house from the left.
But the accommodations were just the first factor, and would soon cease to be the most significant.
The all-inclusive package allowed us to order anything we wanted, or everything, at any time of the night.
For teenagers accustomed to the restrictions of American law (and prices), the prospect of on-demand food and booze, delivered in limitless quantities with just a phone call, was definitely an eye-opener.
A few days into this experience, already bored with lobster tails and filet mignon, we decided to throw caution to the wind and adopt a whole new philosophy of ordering.
It was about midnight when I called up room service and said (I remember the conversation perfectly, despite the state of mind I was in): “Can we have pages two, three, and four from the menu, please?”
It took a few phrases of clarification, but about 45 minutes later, three waiters showed up, platters in hand, with more food than 10 of us had any hope in hell of actually consuming.
Thankfully, our appetites were bolstered by something that wasn’t on the menu.
A National Tradition… a National Problem… a National Solution
You see, the day we arrived, we immediately befriended one of the waiters — a man I still remember fondly to this day — named Joe.
We established rapport on the very first afternoon by straight-out asking him if he could get us a very specific, off-the-menu item.
From that point on, if we ever requested Joe by name, he would come bearing one of the nation’s most famous products.
The local cannabis was grown in the wild and came to us in large quantities for pennies on the dollar compared to the overpriced garbage we ran into back home.
Besides delivering the product, Joe also rolled us the biggest spliffs we’d ever seen. And we smoked those spliffs, usually one per person, without worrying about running out.
On the day of our tired, burned-out, hung-over, sun-baked departure, we had to flush half a dozen or so of Joe’s giant joints down the drain.
It was a crying shame, but a normal side effect of what was then still ironclad prohibition on the plant.
That was back in the 1990s. Today, things have changed.
Jamaica decriminalized cannabis in 2015. Today, anybody caught with two ounces or less of the product faces nothing more than a fine (about $5) and no criminal penalties.
However, the island nation is taking further steps to stem the flow of illegal product, while providing tourists who come to visit with the same thought in their heads that we had all those years ago.
Right now, the Jamaican Cannabis Licensing Authority (CLA), which was created last year, is developing plans to install marijuana kiosks in all of the nation’s airports and seaports.
Charge Your iPhone; Exchange Your Currency; Stock Up on Locally Sourced Dank
The idea: to let tourists satisfy their appetites the moment they arrive.
So instead of making friends with somebody like Joe, you can now just stop by a stand, get a temporary permit, buy what you want, and be on your way without fear of winding up in jail.
The winners: everyone. Tax revenue for the largely impoverished Caribbean nation will help the local population, while legal access to the world’s most popular recreational plant will give visitors what most of them will be looking for anyway.
The losers: perhaps nobody at all. With legalization slowly taking hold, even the black market operators who profit from the contraband right now will be able to transition to legal production and marketing.
For a nation that was long famous for the Rastafarian culture and infamous for the illegal marijuana market, it’s a major step towards mainstream adoption.
It follows in line with similar developments here in the U.S., where the marijuana market is far, far greater and far more complicated in terms of regulations.
The effects are likely to be similar in terms of benefits as well.
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A Proven Business Model, With Close to Zero Downside
One of the main driving forces of the CLA’s initiative is the success story behind Colorado’s marijuana legalization.
As stated by Delano Seiveright, one of the CLA’s 16 members:
In Colorado last year, even though it is recreational and medicinal, they sold about US$1 billion worth of marijuana and collected $135 million in taxes for the state alone with a population of five million plus. The Canadian market for medical, due to their patient system, they earn US$100 million from that alone, and their view is that if they open it up, then they will have a US$5-billion industry and the US overall is about US$5.4 billion last year and US$6.7 billion this year. So you can see the potential it presents.
For a nation that takes about half of its foreign exchange earnings from tourism, stemming from over 2 million visitors per year, the revenue prospects cannot be ignored.
On a global level, however, this says even more about the trend towards decriminalization and legalization.
For a nation whose criminal community has long benefited from its status as the biggest illegal cannabis exporter in the Caribbean to take such a drastic step in embracing the contraband, it means opening the door, at least philosophically, for other nations to do the same.
From Red to Green: Weed’s Global Transition
Already favoring the decriminalization route, the tide towards ending prohibition has already taken hold in much of the Western world, as well as nations with historic intolerance towards illegal drugs, such as Russia and Iran.
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Right now, the bulk of the North, Central, and South American landmass has some level of cannabis reform in place, up to and including open recreational use policies like the kind adopted by Alaska, Oregon, Washington State, and Colorado.
Aside from tax revenues and diminished stresses on the criminal justice system, there has also been one other big winner as the tide continues to shift: industry.
The cannabis industry, once an outlier with limited scientific and mainstream applications, has found new life in previously unanticipated markets.
Everything from medicinal products to building products can be made or improved using this incredibly versatile plant.
And though it’s still largely a crapshoot as to what will take and what will fade away as a flash-in-the-pan novelty, investors are already starting to show their preferences.
Fortune favors the bold,
Alex Koyfman
Check us out on YouTube!His flagship service, Microcap Insider, provides market-beating insights into some of the fastest moving, highest profit-potential companies available for public trading on the U.S. and Canadian exchanges. With more than 5 years of track record to back it up, Microcap Insider is the choice for the growth-minded investor. Alex contributes his thoughts and insights regularly to Energy and Capital. To learn more about Alex, click here.
