African cannabis growers are on a high
But their crop is not for smoking
WHEN HE WAS a child, Lauben Kabagambe’s grandparents in western Uganda would boil cannabis leaves to treat sick animals. “I grew up knowing that it is a medicine,” he recalls. Today, as the boss of Industrial Hemp, a Ugandan cannabis company, he is growing weed in computer-controlled greenhouses in partnership with a subsidiary of Together Pharma, an Israeli firm. In April they exported 250kg of medical cannabis to Israel, the first commercial batch ever to leave Uganda.
This article appeared in the Middle East & Africa section of the print edition under the headline “Pot of gold”
From the May 9th 2020 edition
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