A trade association was announced Thursday in Anchorage to promote the incipient legal marijuana businesses across Alaska.
The Alaska Marijuana Industry Association received their nonprofit status in late April and aims to guide Alaskans who want to legally open marijuana businesses.
Kasilof’s Leif Abel is one of the five board members.
Abel: “Things that I think are most important about an industry association, number one, I think that it’s good for an industry, especially one that is just being created in a legitimate way I should say, is to have a code of conduct and to self-regulate. And that generally sends a message to the general populous and the leaders that we’re being responsible and that indeed we have the ability to take care of some of the concerns without having to over-regulate and spend too much of say the state’s money or the borough’s money.”
Each of the five founding board members plan to become marijuana business owners once licenses become available from the state.
Abel said anyone considering marijuana businesses in Alaska needs to abide by current laws, apply for a license from the state and wait to operate until after the state has granted licenses.
Board member Kim Cole…
Cole: “People who are interested in the business to start looking at all the different aspects that aren’t as fun as watering plants and selling the product. You have to really look at your business plan as the whole business plan, and I think a lot of people are starting to go into this industry with a skewed idea of how easy it is or how fun it is, but this is not easy, it is fun, but it is definitely not an easy undertaking.”
The board said they hope to avoid problems like the state of Washington saw, when not enough licences were issued to producers initially and when they finally were, the market got flooded.
The State of Alaska’s Marijuana Control Board has until November to finalize state commercial regulations.
Licences are expected in spring of 2016.