A Leamington cannabis company has received approval from Health Canada to grow pot.
Canopy Rivers Inc. announced Tuesday that its 49 per cent-owned joint venture, PharmHouse Inc., has received a cultivation licence from Health Canada.
PharmHouse will be immediately commencing operations in 190,000 sq. ft. of licensed nursery infrastructure and plans to ramp up the entire 1.3 million sq. ft. ultramodern greenhouse before the end of 2019.
The company’s plan is to deliver low-cost and high-quality cannabis and cannabis derivative products to the Canopy Rivers ecosystem of partners, both domestically and internationally.
"This is a significant corporate milestone for Canopy Rivers,” said Narbe Alexandrian, president and CEO of Canopy Rivers. “We believe the PharmHouse platform to be the epitome of value creation for our shareholders, and exposure to this project represents an investment opportunity only available through Canopy Rivers."
Alexandrian says together with the expertise of agriculture industry titan Paul Mastronardi, and a team of ag-specialist joint venture partners, Canopy Rivers has helped finance, construct, and prepare for licence one of the largest, state-of-the-art cannabis facilities in the world.
He adds they have already backed it with multi-year contracts with internationally -focused industry leaders that they expect will translate into significant cash flow and profitability.
PharmHouse has already entered into commercial offtake agreements for a combined 50 per cent of its 2020 production with industry leaders Canopy Growth Corp and TerrAscend Corp.
"This licence is a monumental achievement for PharmHouse, a joint venture that I believe represents the future of cannabis production, distribution, and technological innovation," said Mastronardi, CEO of Mastronardi Produce Limited.
In his personal capacity, Mastronardi is the largest individual shareholder in the PharmHouse joint venture.
"We look forward to continuing to lend our proven operational, marketing, and distribution expertise to PharmHouse, and collaborating with Canopy Rivers to continue building our planned global cannabis platform," says Mastronardi.
Paul Mastronardi and the Joint Venture Partners bring significant thought leadership and insight to the cannabis industry, drawing on their successful experience as innovators, marketers, and distributors of greenhouse -grown vegetables for more than 60 years.
Officials say with a focus on new technologies and sustainable cultivation practices, they have become one of the largest greenhouse operators in the world and have experience managing more than 4,000 productive acres of agriculture operations under both an owned/operated and contract manufacturing basis throughout Canada, the U.S., Mexico, Panama, Guatemala, and more.
"Our focus on capacity, innovation, and speed to market has been a competitive advantage of PharmHouse since our company's inception just over a year ago," said Tony Abbas, general manager of PharmHouse. "With the project fully funded and licence now in hand, our strong and focused team intends to continue our rapid progress and ramp up towards full operations in the coming months.”
