To meet increasing demand, state regulators earlier this year awarded additional vertical licenses to three operators covering four dispensary locations.
Notably, the three new licensees all fall under the category of minority- or veteran-owned business enterprises.
“With new companies and new product lines coming out, we expect sales to jump considerably,” Paul Hyland, Delaware’s medical marijuana director, told MJBizDaily.
The state is projecting sales of $37.3 million for 2021, a 35% increase from last year.
At the same time, lawmakers are discussing adult-use legislation. And that’s where it gets contentious.
While existing MMJ operators favor adult-use legalization in principle, they oppose the initial bill because it wouldn’t give them an automatic berth in the recreational marijuana industry.
They also worry that the measure – House Bill 150, which calls for up to 30 retail stores, 30 processors and 60 cultivators – would result in a glut of cannabis on the market.
At a legislative hearing in March, representatives from five existing MMJ licensees – including New York-based Columbia Care – complained, saying the bill’s provisions would crush the medical cannabis industry by dramatically increasing cultivation capacity and not enabling MMJ operators to automatically participate in a new adult-use market.