Indopedia All Things Marijuana
America’s cannabis industry has long been hostile to people of color. While the mostly white farmers of Northern California were hiding massive farms from prying feds, black Americans just hours away in Oakland, San Francisco, and across the country have faced decades of racist policing that has ruined lives, filled jails, and attached permanent criminal records for no reason other than the color of their skin.
But as medical and recreational cannabis legalization laws spread from the Golden State to New England and almost everywhere in between, equity programs and changing attitudes have sparked a changing of the guard. In the final installment of Marijuana Business Daily’s three-part look at women and minorities in the cannabis industry, researchers found that only 17% of the country’s legal weed businesses are led by minority executives.
The data comes from a survey of 567 people who self-identify as marijuana industry “senior executives or owners/founders” and further breaks down the industry by business type. And while 17% is a higher percentage of minority executives and owners than corporate America on a whole, there are still some glaring…
