lebanon is the third largest producer of
cannabis resin
for decades this underground business
has been controlled by the communities
of the baka valley
but in 2020 this changed as lebanon
became the first arab country to
legalize cannabis cultivation for
medicinal exports
in the face of economic ruin a raging
covet problem
and the capital city devastated by one
of the world's largest non-nuclear
blasts in modern history
the government is looking at the
enormous cannabis industry
as a way of propping up the economy this
is one of the highest yielding
and value crops in the world it's like
growing money on trees it is
for the autonomous communities currently
running the we trade though
this isn't great news dealers have been
happily getting rich from the illegal
trade for decades
and they don't want a government that
they neither trust nor respect stepping
into their world
is the center of a potentially violent
tension between the old drug networks
run by diy
criminal communities and the unstoppable
world of big business taking over
medicinal marijuana
[Music]
hello everyone good good
hello i've come to beirut to meet daniel
yesbik
a lebanese-american businessman who
helped the government draft the recent
legislation
daniel has been investing in legal
cannabis industries around the world
since 2013
and he's come to lebanon hoping to be
the first to capitalize on the lebanese
cannabis market
so you can take this cbd now and infuse
it and make a cbd
patch so i can go in here and put a a
transdermal patch for pain
right you'll have interesting products
like these this one you're going to like
and this is
this is i don't know if you're going to
like it it's a suppository so basically
so basically this what got you so
excited at the time to be contacting
people
about specifically lebanon before it was
even legalized
there's a lot of reasons i want to come
to lebanon but one of the one of the
primary interesting things is that it's
it's very it
costs very it's very cheap to produce
cannabis in lebanon
and it's and it's even cheaper today
with the economic crisis
and because the lebanese lira versus the
dollar beyond this and even more
importantly
the lebanese cannabis genetics the
lebanese cannabis plant in itself
has unique properties that makes it more
medicinally relevant
okay so it's got a higher cbd to thc
ratio and cbd is the miracle molecule
do you have any fears that you might
lose millions in this deal
once it gets going i won't have fears
it's a crop that grows it's like growing
money on trees it is
this is one of the highest yielding and
value crops in the world
and it's the most medically relevant
it's beautiful
it's such a beautiful plant you know
many view this especially the growers
the farmers the people in the
autonomous communities in the baka
valley view this as a capitalization
on an already existing industry what do
you think about that
well it's already exist but these people
have warrants on their heads do you want
to continue to live with warrants on
your heads and then basically a bunch of
guns and people protecting you and then
every once in a while when the
government feels the right grading if
that's what you want it's for their own
sake as well i mean
they can continue to operate but you
can't operate so flat
so publicly that's that's almost public
corruption in your face
but then you're saying well we're hungry
so we need to feed our families
okay but you know technically it's not
legal
in the past violence erupted as the
government attempted to eradicate the
illegal trade
while failing to provide an alternative
source of income for farmers
these communities became more heavily
armed and protective of their crops
unable to interfere the government was
forced to turn a blind eye to the
illicit industry
this has resulted in a power struggle
between the armed shia drug trafficking
families who operate under tribal law
essentially the vaka valley has become a
wild west of the middle east
where fighting breaks out between tribes
and then with the army when it attempts
to enforce peace
since 2011 as the war in syria raged
and the army was busy protecting the
border from insurgents
power shifted further into the hands of
the cartels and the cannabis industry
boomed
despite the new law being passed and
millions of dollars being offered by
investors
there's still no mechanism in place to
make things happen
[Music]
i'm on my way to the baka valley where
i'm going to be meeting ali
ali runs a cannabis business and he
operates mainly in the black market
i want to talk to him and see if he's
willing to transition to a form of white
market
and what his conditions would be ali is
one of the baka valley's 40
000 people who have government warrants
out for their arrest
we're coming up on a checkpoint now
we just got pulled over by a checkpoint
for having the cameras but luckily they
let us pass these towns are riddled with
checkpoints they're surrounded by
checkpoints by the army and the police
force
and it's hard to get in and out
sometimes
but somehow they managed to run a global
export business
of cannabis an illegal export business
of cannabis
[Music]
daniel will be joining us as well he
wants to show ali
what the future of this business could
potentially be
contrary to most cannabis farmers it was
obvious that ali made a fortune from the
cannabis trade
enough to set him and his family up in a
lavish estate
facility actor in the tamil
foreign
m
foreign
[Music]
foreign
daniel hopes to persuade ali to
cooperate with the government
by illustrating advancements in the
global cannabis industry
we arrive at one of highly's cannabis
storage facilities
where daniel can test the levels of thc
and cbd in the product
with his patented portable device
foreign
months have gone by since the cannabis
bill passed into law
but nothing has moved on this paralysis
is symptomatic of a country that has
been left rudderless
since its government resigned last
august in the aftermath of the beirut
port explosion
i can say
[Music]
you