28. Spannabis 20th Edition - Reflections of The Awesome, The Bad and the Downright Ugly!

00:48 - The New Year now begins in March as nature intended
03:40 - C-Days at the Cannabis Hub - is Da Bomb!!
07:06 - The CSC threat proves real
09:57 - The ICBC - B2B Networking
12:56 - Shiny Happy People return my phone!
15:39 - The shaming of synthetic HHC
18:42 - The Rumblings of German Legalisation
21:30 - Karl Lauterfach man of Vision proves it can be done
26.20 - Ireland no hope as ever

“There are decades where nothing happens; and there are weeks where decades happen.”
― Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

This a quick refresh and some of my reflections during a fortnight that saw Germany legalise, the UN make 'Harm Reduction' resolutions and the EU has less place to hide!!

The Awesome - Spannabis has now morphed into ‘Spannabis Week’ with events developing all around the central Core of the 3 day Spannabis Fair this year celebrating it’s 30th year with the 30,000 smiley happy people

The Wednesday - C-Days at the Cannabis Hub is now officially my favourite event of the ‘week’ taking place as ever in an extremely cool department of the UPC Polytechnic university of Catalunya.
Think UCD’s Innovation Academy or Trinity’s Tangent EXCEPT devoted to the wonder plant that is Cannabis and its myriad of uses!
In previous years the students would often deliver their Innovation pitches to VCs who would be gathered in BCN for the week. This year was more focused on the professional with an awesome schedule of Scientists and Industry leaders all brought together under the brilliant Ruben Varlenzuela one of the primary lecturers and hugely successful Cannabis entrepreneur.
The Cannabis Hub offers a Masters in Cannabis and also a bunch of qualifications for the industry - See the site here: https://cannabis-hub.org/

Those VCs would be here primarily for the big B2B event known as the ICBC which takes place on the Thursday where the knowledge sharing and hardcore business networking and deals are further developed! - https://internationalcbc.com/barcelona/

The 'Bad' - Friday is the first day of the Spannabis fair proper a massive Expo with events spread across 3 days at Fira Cornella which while it has been the site from the outset it always frames some of my personal ‘Bad’ as depending what side of the city you are at it always seems a nightmare to get to despite BCN’s amazing public transport.
But we will always keep going back… and really it will never be a dealbreaker!
2024 the weather was perfect as it was not too hot and just right for bopping with the amazing music as ever offered on the outside stage.
Friday and Saturday also offered a pretty cool line up at the Cannabis Conference which takes place in the auditorium onsite with some big hitters from the industry sharing their pearls!
A highlight was definitely the amazing Thai activist Kitty Chopaka who has been to the fore of Thailand's Legalisation from the beginning and gave an enlightening Talk as to what is happening there!

The ‘Damn Ugly’ title I reserved for the real bad vibe set in motion by the Town Hall threat to close ‘ALL’ the clubs and they decided and then to send the 'Mossos' out to make their presence felt. Many of the clubs were raided over the weekend but they were also stopping ‘Guiris’ on the metro and literally and absurdly had sniffer dogs at the train station beside the Spannabis site. I myself 'con baston' was challenged by a dog as it took a liking to the smell of my PAX in my pocket... but bringing dogs out to sniff around people returning from the site doesn't bear thinking about how pathetic that is!!!

The other 'Ugly' has become the now perennial bug bear of the presence of synthetic HHC products which seem to be more prevalent now each year. but the packaging!!!
Another of my personal bug bears of how badly this industry despite much talk of the uses of Hemp fails to replace plastics etc
The place was once again full of bad packaging and Single use vapes, as an industry we really must try to do better!!

Still another amazing, inspiring edition that sought to inspire us all to find away to get to Madrid for 11th of May to hit the streets for Día Mundial de la Marihuana

The Fight goes on!!