This year, LSU and Southern will embark on a new journey to cultivate barrier-breaking medical marijuana production programs.
As 225 details in a feature in its current issue, a state law signed in 2015 cleared the way to legally grow, prescribe and dispense medicinal marijuana in Louisiana. The LSU and Southern AgCenters were given first rights of refusal to produce the product, and both universities embraced the opportunity.
“Initially, we were not really sure about it. (Lawmakers) did put in an opt-out provision in the law,” LSU Vice President of Agriculture Bill Richardson says. “We had several months to consider it. Then, we became much more excited about the potential for what we could do research-wise. We knew that we probably could help some people, and it was something that we had expertise in on the growing side of it. So, we’ve embraced it and are looking forward to hopefully making the effort successful in Louisiana.”
Richardson says state lawmakers, who did not want the product grown in the private sector, saw the LSU and Southern AgCenters was the most obvious choice for producers of the medical product.
Richardson says the marijuana will be grown in a secure warehouse and no students at either university will work in the facility. He describes LSU’s planned operation as a “seed-to-pill” venture.
The AgCenter, Richardson says, views the medical marijuana venture from a pharmaceutical perspective.
“We’ve got some folks who are working on the extraction formulation and the testing aspects,” he says. “We want to make sure that we have a product that’s safe and free of contaminants, so that when someone goes to their doctor and gets a recommendation that gets filled by one of the dispensaries, they’ve got a quality product they can use.”
