123 billion euros by 2028
The European market is exploding. 6 countries have announced laws favorable to cultivation and sale. Europe is one of the most promising markets.
The European cannabis industry has grown more in the past twelve months than in the past six years. Six countries have announced new legislative measures (in favor of cultivation and sale, ed ) and already 500 million euros have been invested in the business.
In 5 Years, the European Market Will Be the Largest In the World
In the research “The European Cannabis Report”, published in the end of 2020, the company puts on paper the numbers of the boom that, at current growth rates, would occur in the next ten years in Europe, bringing the cannabis market (THC) at a total value of 123 billion euros by 2028, about 70% of the current total turnover of the pharmaceutical industry in the continent (data as of June 2016). 58 billion would be produced, in fact, in the medical-pharmaceutical sector and 65 billion would come from “recreational” use .
The Likelihood of Cannabis Being Legalized in Europe
“In the next five years, the European market is likely to be the largest in the world, surpassing even the total sales of the United States and Canada,” the report states.
The numbers appear even more significant if we consider that they mainly include THC-based products (tetrahydrocannabinol, psychoactive), while data on sales of CBD hemp (cannabidiol, also known as “cannabis light”, non-psychoactive) were not included in the final calculation, both because it is still difficult to find them, and because it is a substance that does not require a medical prescription, and has therefore been excluded from the market estimates on cannabis for pharmaceutical use.
Already today, according to the estimates of the European Industrial Hemp Association (EIHA), the European market of CBD for pharmaceutical use would have a value of 2 billion euros.
Anti-Inflammatory and Anxiolytic. Only in Words?
The CBD flower hemp is the Trojan horse of the future boom of cannabis, pending the gradually legalized THC, as has happened in many US states and Canada, since it can now be bought freely in almost all European countries, with the exception of Slovakia, where it is still illegal, and Denmark and Malta, which require a prescription.
The legislative context is still uncertain, especially following a recent ruling by the Supreme Court. CBD is the main non-psychoactive component of cannabis sativa and is contained in varying percentages in oils, flowers or creams. Its properties would be multiple, at least at a potential level, given that the scientific evidence is still few: ant-inflammatory, anticonvulsant, antioxidant, antiemetic, anxiolytic, antipsychotic, even antiepileptic.
“It’s kind of a new snake oil , ” Dustin Lee, associate professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at John Hopkins University in Baltimore, told The New York Times. Despite the many experiments already carried out and in progress, for now we are moving more on the level of potential than on certain, documentable and coherent effects.