Michael Armstrong, Associate Professor of Operations Research in Brock’s Goodman School of Business, wrote a piece recently published in The Conversation about the shortage of legal cannabis available in Canada.

Armstrong writes:

Ontario’s first legal cannabis shops are finally here. One challenge they’ll face is Canada’s nationwide product shortage. That’s despite repeated federal government assurances of ample supplies.

Cannabis shortages certainly seem to exist. Ontario blames them for its initial 25-store limit. Alberta is also restricting shop licences, while Québec limits shopping hours.

However, federal officials disagree. Bill Blair, the minister leading Cannabis Act implementation, has repeatedly said supplies are “adequate” and even “exceed existing demand.”

Similarly, Health Canada last week claimed “there is not — as some have suggested — a national shortage of supply of cannabis.” It earlier had bragged that January’s dry (smoke-able) cannabis inventories were so large they equalled “19 times the amount sold.”

But the government’s own data shows it’s blowing smoke.

Continue reading the full article here.