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Busia, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Stephen Mugeni Wasike, the Busia district LC V chairperson wants the government to construct a marijuana processing facility in the border export zone market.
Construction of the Shillings 800 Billion Busia export zone market, which is ongoing in Masafu town council, is expected to be completed in seven years. The market is being constructed into phases under the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa-COMESA, through the Ministry of Trade and Industry.
According to the plan, the market will comprise a warehouse, cottage industry, assorted value addition plants, export zone stalls, processing center, grain milling and silos, bank, forex bureaus and space for clearing firms, hotels and offices for Immigration, Uganda Revenue Authority-URA and Uganda National Bureau of Standards-UNBS and general market among others.
However, the Busia LC V chairperson wants the government to include a marijuana processing plant. Marijuana farming is common in Buhehe, Masaba, Masinya, Masafu and Lumino sub-counties.
While addressing farmers at Dabani sub-county headquarters, Mugeni said that once the government embraces his proposal to include a marijuana processing facility in the export zone market, they are ready to source potential cannabis investors to produce drugs and create jobs for locals.
Juma Maloba and Sam Egesa Lumonya, both farmers in Busia district, say that many of them practice marijuana farming in hiding for fear of arrest. They however say that they are ready to specialize in marijuana farming once the processing plant is built.
Lumonya says that the proposed completion of the export market is long overdue to enable them to engage in cash crop farming.
Godfrey Ongwabe, the export construction project supervisor in Busia says that it’s the ministry of trade to design and include the facility if necessary. Marijuana growing is still illegal in the country. The National Drug Policy and Authority Act, 1993 provides that “No person shall, without the written consent of the Health Minister… cultivate any plant from which a narcotic drug can be extracted”.
In June 2019, an Israeli firm, Together Pharma Limited reported its first marijuana harvest from Uganda, despite a government announcement that the license had been halted. The company reportedly completed the first harvesting of cannabis inflorescences at its farm in Uganda on June 18, 2019, and sowed another 10 dunams on the company’s farm in Uganda on the same day.
Another company Hemp is growing medicinal marijuana in Kasese district. The same year, media reports indicated that up to 90 companies had applied to government to grow medicinal marijuana.
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