Amid declining medical cannabis sales in Canada’s domestic market and cutthroat competition in the adult-use industry, some licensed producers are increasingly looking to overseas markets for a financial lifeline.
Exports continued to surge in the 2022-23 fiscal year, with Canada shipping medical cannabis products worth 160 million Canadian dollars ($118 million) overseas, a 50% increase over 2021-22’s CA$107 million, according to figures shared by Health Canada with MJBizDaily.
David Hyde, CEO of Hyde Advisory & Investments in Toronto, believes Canada will have a leg up over competing export countries for a few more years.
“For the next two or three years, at least, we’re going to see continually increasing medical numbers (exports),” he said in a phone interview.
The brisk export growth comes as domestic sales of medical cannabis continue to contract.
Canadian domestic sales from April 1, 2022, to March 31, 2023, were CA$401 million, which was 9% lower than the previous year and 20% lower than the same period two years earlier, when medical cannabis sales were CA$501 million.
When medical exports are combined with domestic sales, Canada’s medical cannabis industry was worth CA$570 million last year – still the largest federally regulated medical marijuana industry in the world.
LIRE LA SUITE: MJBIzDaily