What’s Next For the Hemp Industry
In our latest Trade To Black podcast presented by Flowhub, hosts Shadd Dales and Anthony Varrell welcome Dr. Paul Shields, chief medical officer at Vantage Hemp, and Thomas Winstanley, president of Edibles.com, with the December 11 federal hemp deadline approaching.
Varrell opens by predicting Congress will extend the hemp deadline again rather than let the ban take effect. The hosts also note that Trulieve has paid off the $65 million mortgage on its Jefferson County, Florida, facility.
This week’s NuggMD Check In Poll of the Week asked how cannabis has affected alcohol consumption. Of 1,005 respondents, 32% say they have completely replaced alcohol with cannabis and 26% say it has greatly decreased their drinking. Only 5% say they drink more, down from 9% in January 2025. Varrell suspects most of that substitution happens at home rather than at stadiums or bars.
In the Vantage Standard segment, Shields responds to the DEA’s updated drug guide, which again reports no overdose deaths from marijuana. He explains that THC affects people differently because of genetic variation in how the liver metabolizes it. Heavy daily use also desensitizes the brain’s CB1 receptors, though they return to baseline within about four weeks, which is why tolerance breaks work.
Shields notes that endocannabinoid receptors exist in every tissue in the body. He sees potential for a single broad-spectrum product to treat older patients with cognitive decline, poor appetite and anxiety, conditions that currently require several prescriptions.
In our final segment, Winstanley calls the recent short-term hemp extension a starting point and says the midterms will shape what comes next. He favors 21-and-over sales, child-safe packaging, potency limits, mandatory third-party testing and a domestic supply chain, with low-dose products sold over the counter and higher doses left to dispensaries. He points to Georgia, which allows 10-milligram hemp servings backed by strong enforcement, as a model.
