Here is a quote from the latest news article from the state of Maine and their proposed seed to sale tracking system. I had previously heard that the wise legislatures knew that a seed to sale tracking system, for the TOTAL of 36 PLANTS that a Caregiver is allowed to grow, was going to be burdensome, costly, and unnecessary. The additional RFID chip costs, labels, and additional storage and curing bins will make this a very difficult and cumbersome addition to the Maine Medical Marijuana program.
That is why the entire medical industry and Caregeivers were opposed to NO.1 in 2016, as it was believed (correctly) that it would consolidate the medical and recreational programs together, and give total control to the legislature, (who are prohibitionists) to re-write all of the medical laws, and change the entire program forever.
As they said they would not.
Well, that has turned out to be a reality, even though "they" said they would not combine the two, or make it inherently burdensome on an already burdened industry. As point of fact, the legislature has already changed the Maine Medical Program from the DHHS, to the DAFS. They have now voted to implement a costly and burdensome addition to the already limited grow of 36 TOTAL PLANTS, to create more costs, more paperwork, more headaches, to a small mom and pop industry, where most caregivers are not making profits at current, and who are putting in all of their available time and savings to stay afloat.
Please read article below. It is past time for the legislature to implement the law that was passed by the voters in 2016, not to implement an uninformed prohibitionist tweaked law that will only make it extremely difficult to stay afloat and run a small business, without out of state millions, ($$$$) and highly paid lobbyists, as Patricia Rossi of the Wellness Connection has. Not to mention the generous donation from Mrs. Rossi to the Janet Mills campaign. (look that up yourself online, it is astounding, and should be deemed inappropriate and illegal)
PORTLAND, Maine — Some Maine marijuana business owners believe new regulations to the industry announced Tuesday will help cut down on the black market.
The Department of Administrative and Financial Services said Tuesday that it will use a cloud-based software, called "Metrc," to track the growth and sale of marijuana and marijuana products in the state.
"It's going to force people to go from operating in somewhat of a grey area to being fully compliant," said McLeod. "I think if you're in this business and you're not expecting it, you're going to run into some issues."
The new software will use radio-frequency identification tags. License holders will pay $40 a month, as well as plant tag and packaging label fees.
"Metrc" lists specific benefits to using these types of tags:
"The advantage of these more “intelligent” systems is that, unlike barcode-based data collection, an RFID system can read the information on a tag without requiring line of sight, without a particular orientation or from short read distances," the website reads. "While looking at these advantages it is important to note the particular application benefits. The Marijuana industry has a fragile product that is highly susceptible to damage, as communicated by several companies and industry organizations.
METRC website LINK. click.
METRC website LINK. click.
