Medi Kingdom Project Status Statement

Rhizo Sciences was approached by Medi Kingdom in mid-2017 to consult on, design and develop an export grade medical cannabis production facility in the Kingdom of Lesotho, Africa.

We prepared plans for a world class export facility, helped them to attain a commercial production license and INCB quota, and facilitated the first export of medical cannabis from Africa to Canada. We also provided extensive marketing and business consulting along with a conditional offtake agreement and other support in order to prepare Medi Kingdom to become investor ready.

Rhizo Sciences travelled to co-represent Medi Kingdom to qualified investors and secure a agreement from a publicly listed company. During negotiations with a Venture Capital group in August 2018 in Australia, Medi Kingdom’s director James Mather reneged on all previous agreed undertakings to Rhizo Sciences. Subsequent efforts at communication with the management of Medi Kingdom or their VC partners have been ignored.

The proposed project relied entirely on professional project execution by experienced international specialists to meet export requirements. We have had no involvement or communications with Medi Kingdom since we discontinued. Our experience left us with concerns in the capacity of Medi Kingdom’s management to successfully execute in this highly regulated industry.

This experience has however strengthened our emphasis on ensuring aspirational cannabis companies address key management, governance and funding milestones before focussing on licensing and capital deployment.

Rhizo Sciences remains bullish about the African cannabis industry and we continue to work with professionally cannabis companies and investors to develop GMP production and export facilities across the region.

Unfortunately many companies and investors approach have a gold rush mentality and approach this as a “get rich quick” market but nothing could be further from the truth.

The cannabis industry is currently one of the most heavily regulated industries in the world. Only a handful of companies have successfully developed GMP export facilities at scale.

Developing a successful export company takes years and a team of experienced professionals. The investment required is substantial and reaching commercial production takes 2-3 years – even in mature markets such as Canada.

At this stage many African states may still lack the essential compliance and governance capacity required to give investors and regulators confidence and allow commercial production.

Companies planning to operate in emerging markets such as Lesotho or other African countries also face additional challenges due to remote locations and lack of key infrastructure. The biggest challenge is lack of access to professional medical cannabis expertise capable of operating a legal, compliant business. As such, collaboration with capable strategic partners is essential for serious groups considering investment in this emerging international industry.