Organic Growth Holdings Jamaica Ltd. (OGH) said it has secured a capital investment of US$1 million to expand its Trelawny, Jamaica operations.
The company plans to produce CBD, broad-spectrum distillates and wellness products. The money was raised through Stocks and Securities Limited (SSL), a Jamaican investment adviser in wealth management and financial planning.
$4 million investment
OGH’s operations represent a total $4 million investment, Mitchel Yeckes, the company’s managing director, has said.
The injection of capital will help OGH develop and keep running current operations on 635 acres at a former estate in Trelawny, where hemp is among the crops grown. “We are maintaining all safety standards to plant, harvest and manufacture in order to keep the wheels of our operations turning and our local Jamaican employees working,” said Robert Weinstein president and co-founder of OGH.
“There is a strong platform for shrewd investment amid the challenges of the current economic climate,” SSL Group CEO Zachary Harding said of the current capital environment, as the CBD sector overheated, quickly followed by the coronavirus pandemic.
‘Bankable potential’
“During this time when the entire world is focused on health, we see bankable potential for locally produced CBD,” Harding said.
Jamaica’s government is supporting the hemp industry on the island nation. “We want to tap into this market and to reduce our reliance on imports,” Audley Shaw, Minister of Industry, Commerce, Agriculture and Fisheries, said at the ground-breaking ceremony for OGH’s Organic Grow Jamaica Craft Medicinal Hemp Farm at the former Long Pond Estate late last year.
“With our close proximity to the U.S., Jamaica’s hemp industry is strategically poised for growth as we seek to tap into this large market,” Shaw said.
No threat to weed growers
Shaw has emphasized that the hemp industry is no threat to the local marijuana trade as standards are in place to avoid cross pollination. That concern had been a major hangup to getting hemp approved for growing in Jamaica.
“We are very mindful that we must endeavour to protect our local indigenous strains of cannabis and the Jamaican brand, which is synonymous with premium quality,” Shaw said.
