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Greenhouse growers & suppliers at IFPA 2025

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For many exhibitors, the IFPA Global Show requires months of preparation. From choosing the best booth location, coming up with an attractive layout, to launching new products and organizing parties. Needless to say, a lot of time and effort goes into this highly anticipated event that some call the Super Bowl of products. Last week, it was finally here. On October 17th and 18th, approximately 20,000 attendees from more than 50 countries around the world converged on Anaheim, California for an expo, educational sessions, camaraderie, and more.

Among them were the big players in North American greenhouses, and when they are somewhere, we all know the suppliers will follow, and so will we. So today we are sharing a photo report of greenhouse growers and horticulture suppliers.

Click here for the photo report.

Want more? Click here for the photo report fresh produce industryhas Fresh produce companies in Latin Americaor, if you prefer flowers, gardening companies.

What’s in fashion?
So what about the show. Many new products were introduced and many of them were variants of a category. Salad kits in different flavors, adding new colors to an existing tomato line and continued focus on better varieties in the berry segment. In the mushroom category, a new soup kit was introduced. This year’s highlights were the asparagus products and a cucumber picking kit, which includes not only cucumbers but also spices and garlic. Fermentation also seems to be picking up steam, as evidenced by kombucha drinks and kimchee. Will these products continue to be included in the category?

© Marieke Hemmes | MMJDaily.com

Click here for a photo report of the show.

the snack
It’s not new, but it’s definitely expanding the range of products in the snack segment. More tomatoes and cucumbers and new snacks were launched, but the show floor also saw celery sticks that go in kid’s lunch packs, carrots with dips, berries in small snack containers and nuts for dessert. Also, the availability of products in the nuts segment is expanding with dragon nuts and dried grapefruit strips. Packaging options for snacks also continue to expand.

The show’s attendees couldn’t complain when it came to snacking. Many companies were testing products with Dubai’s chocolate-dipped strawberries being very popular. The avocado toast bar was a busy place, with people lining up to sip the different fruit juices they were trying.

Extending the growing season
On the growing side, some US growers have cited a tough year to date as prices for some vegetable products have been low. While it wasn’t a perfect summer on the East Coast, most of the fresh produce escaped the extremes, which resulted in good yields. The crops in California did not have to endure intense heat, which also benefited the production volume. Exhibition breeders and growers are increasingly focusing on extending growing seasons. In addition to US and Canadian producers, IFPA has a strong representation of Mexican producers who market their products in the US.

Floor design
There has been a significant change in the floor plan this year, as the Flower section is cut into another building opposite the product display. The floral exhibition opened an hour earlier to give attendees more time to visit both exhibitions. The reason for creating a separate exhibition space for Floral was related to space, as the segment has seen a lot of growth in recent years. The Anaheim convention center can no longer accommodate both shows on one floor, but when the show returns to Orlando in 2026, the segments will likely be reunited.

Overall, exhibitors were happy with the floor plan design and turnout. The first day was definitely more crowded than the second day, but that is no longer surprising. However, some exhibitors mentioned that they missed the presence of some retail banners. Since the show is held on the west coast, not all east coast merchants had the opportunity to participate.

Next year, the show will return to Orlando, FL from October 15-17, 2026.

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Bountiful Farms goes best in New England at NECANN Cup

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Bountiful Farms placed first and second in the licensed solvent-free concentrate division at this year’s NECANN Cup, then also won the mixed licensed and unlicensed division to win best overall, putting the Massachusetts operator in the running for best in show with the highest-scoring product in New England.

© Bountiful Farms

NECANN is the largest B2B cannabis event in New England and the second largest in the country, attracting over 9,000 attendees. Everything is unbranded. Licensed and unlicensed operators in the six New England states compete only in product. Zachary Taylor, Director of Agriculture at Bountiful Farms, says the win for Maine’s craft growers means a lot to him and his team. “Whenever you compete against Maine, with its regulations and the craft culture of the caretakers, to be considered a craft on our scale is the greatest honor. When you look at cups across the nation, you see cups of culture, and Maine is always well represented. To be recognized on the same playing field and to excel at this scale is very difficult, and I don’t think that’s what people mean.”

Of course, rosin isn’t given more forcefully to Bountiful Farms. But Zach in a clean way© Bountiful Farms he says, “A good raisin doesn’t appear out of nowhere. It comes from the flower.” The award-winning genetics were bred by Crystal Rose, and built around a high-resin, terpene-rich expression.

“The buds come in within 15 minutes of harvest, it’s like a timer,” Zach says. “Then we move them to a chest freezer, before moving them to an aisle freezer, where they’ll sit until they’re cleaned. All the rosin is pressed by hand in a hydraulic press.” At its scale, Bountiful Farms must use automation to achieve consistently high quality. “But we have very practical components,” he said. “The backlash of the press tells you how hard it is to go. Same approach with agitation, for example. The flower heads themselves, how we maintain the integrity of the trichome, the rise time of the wash, the temperatures: everything is handled like a small-scale race.”

That level of attention comes from the team. Matt Bearup, now a solventless QC manager, started growing and built the hash lab from the ground up all by himself. There are currently eight hash makers, all passionate about complex genetics and terpenes. Strains include not only the main terpenes, but also tasting notes and effects. Using the SC Lab framework, limonene as the current focus. “There’s not a lot of that in the hashish sector in particular. Several growers are moving in that direction.”

© Bountiful Farms

“There’s not a lot like it. Several breeders are moving in that direction.”

Bountiful Farms has been producing rosin since 2021, when the category had little traction© Bountiful Farms in Massachusetts. Since then, the company has expanded into a high-end cultivation center to produce even more rosin. They operate two production rooms and processes not only for themselves, but also for other clients including Native Sun, Breathe Free and u4ea. They have recently opened two new dispensaries, allowing them to expand into recreational retail from 2021. Another limited release of the full melt is planned, along with a dual-cartridge solvent-free pen developed with O2 Vapes, two flavors in one device.

“When you bring award-winning companies together, you get products that represent the industry at its best. Massachusetts deserves its place among the leaders in this industry. When we win, the industry wins.”

For more information:
Prosperous Farms
prosperous farm. take care of

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Federal Drug Testing Rule Will Require ‘Directly Observed’ Urine Collection From Truck Drivers

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“A month that goes by without an oral fluid test is another month when federal employees with paruresis face anxiety, discrimination, and barriers.”

By Kastalia Medrano, Filter

The Department of Transportation will require “directly observed” urine drug testing in federal employment situations where saliva testing is required but not possible. The clarification of DOT drug and alcohol testing procedures is the latest development in a years-long push by the trucking industry. oral fluid testing as an alternative to urine testing.

The new rule was published in the Federal Register on May 11, and will go into effect on June 10.

Truck drivers, who are subject to a large number of federal regulations, do not choose the method of drug testing, while DOT-regulated employers do. The campaign to implement oral fluid testing has been led by the American Trucking Association (ATA), which believes it is necessary to “keep drivers with disabilities off the road and maintain the trucking industry’s commitment to safety.”

The Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) approved lab-based oral fluid testing in 2019, and the DOT finalized its regulations in 2023 allowing employers to choose this as an alternative to urine testing. But the actual implementation requires at least. Two laboratories approved by the Food and Drug Administration to process tests—one for the initial analysis and another to confirm the results. There are currently zero.

Oral fluid testing is attractive to many employers for a number of reasons, one of which is its effectiveness in detecting drug use within hours compared to urine drug testing. While the trucking industry has become the public face of the campaign, the regulations also affect federal workers in the commercial aviation, railroad, public transportation and pipeline sectors.

One of the main concerns expressed by the trucking industry has been that urine drug screens are not visible, making it easier to avoid oral fluid testing. Another concern is paruresis, commonly referred to as “shy bladder” syndrome: if a driver can’t urinate when they need to, they’re stuck for a three-hour wait, which obviously affects their arrival time. And if they still cannot produce urine during this period, they are considered to have refused to take the test and are removed from their duties. To return, they must “pass” a urine test watched by a same-sex observer.

New DOT the rule also updates existing terminology by replacing the word “gender” with the word “sex” in accordance with President Donald Trump’s January 2025 executive order “Defending Women from Gender Ideological Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government.”

“A month that goes without an oral fluid test is another month when federal employees with paruresis face anxiety, discrimination and professional barriers,” Dr. Steven Soifer, co-founder of the International Paruresis Society, said in March. “We have been working on this issue since our inception (30 years ago). Our members ask the same question every day: When will the federal government finish the work it has already approved?”

In April, at the request of ATA, six members of Congress he wrote Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to the Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services citing FDA regulatory hurdles as the reason why laboratories in the United States are not certified to process oral fluid tests.

They cited an analysis by Quest Diagnostics that showed a 370 percent increase in “replaced” urine specimens from 2022 to 2023. Quest has its own laboratory-based oral fluid collection method, Quantisal™, and has therefore been an ardent supporter of the campaign.

On May 1, the FDA a notice with the intention of considering revising the requirements for toxicology studies. That same day SAMHSA a the list It confirms that currently certified laboratories, which will probably be updated in the future, but are not available at the moment.

However, at the end of the day, HHS handles oral fluid testing in a similar scenario to hair follicle testing. The department promised to create guidelines for hair testing in 2015, but has yet to do so.

This the article originally posted by The filteran online magazine that deals with drug use, drug policy and human rights from a harm reduction perspective. Follow Filter on Bluesky, X or Facebookand sign up for their newsletter.

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TSA clarifies that cannabis policy has not changed

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Over the past week, many news organizations have been running exaggerated headlines about a supposed change by the federal government to allow marijuana to be brought into airports and airplanes. But it’s not true, the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) tells Marijuana Moment.

“TSA’s policy on medical marijuana has not changed,” a TSA spokeswoman said in an email Wednesday.

“According to the TSA website: If any illegal substance or evidence of criminal activity is found during the security screening, TSA will refer the matter to law enforcement,” they said. While it’s true that the agency’s list of medical marijuana “What can I bring?” section of its website was updated on April 27, there were no major changes in policy.

Currently, the website says “Yes,” passengers can carry medical marijuana in carry-on and checked bags with special instructions. But the TSA cannabis policy has said “Yes” to medical marijuana, with the same caveats, since 2019.

Read more at Marijuana Moment










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