EBERSBACH, GERMANY - In the east German countryside, close to Dresden, a former abattoir is now home to the biggest indoor cannabis farm in Europe.
But the budding industry is eyeing a bigger prize: Chancellor Olaf Scholz's government plans to legalise the drug for recreational use as soon as 2024, which would leave it with one of the most liberal cannabis policies in Europe.Inside the building, the smell of the plants -- lined up in their hundreds under yellow grow lamps -- is overwhelming.
Demecan's massive complex, which covers around 120,000 square metres , produces one tonne of cannabis a year, but it has yet to reach capacity.Harvests at the farm happen every two weeks with workers plucking the flowers from the plant stems before they are dried. As well as its own production efforts, Demecan has a license for the import of another 20 tonnes of cannabis into the country from Canada annually.
Berlin startup Cantourage, a manufacturer of cannabis-based medicines, floated 15 percent of its shares on the Frankfurt stock exchange in November.