Israel May Apply Import Fees On Canadian Cannabis
Israel’s government is considering imposing import fees on medical cannabis products imported from Canada. Israel previously launched an “anti-dumping” investigation to determine if Canadian cannabis imports were hurting the nation’s domestic industry. In the fiscal year 2023, Israel imported about 21,000 kilograms of medical cannabis products from Canada’s emerging legal cannabis industry.
The investigation’s preliminary findings seem to have determined that prices for Canadian cannabis have impacted Israel’s medical cannabis industry and that a proposed ‘fix’ will come in the form of import fees.
A final decision on whether to implement import fees on Canadian medical cannabis products is expected sometime later this year. Per initial reporting by StratCann:
In the course of the investigation, it was determined that the large volume of cannabis sold into the Israeli medical market from Canada was having a significant impact on both the local market and domestic companies’ ability to compete.
These products, determined Tal’s report, were sold at lower prices that, he argues, do not reflect the normal course of business and at prices that are lower than production costs or from their prices in the Israeli market, especially given the additional costs of exporting cannabis from Canada.
StratCann reports that roughly 80% of cannabis imported by Israel currently comes from Canada. The remaining imports reportedly originate from Portugal, Uruguay, and Uganda. Israel’s investigation “determined that a fair price for Canadian cannabis sold into the Israeli market was about $2-8 a gram” according to StratCann.
Israel’s legal medical cannabis industry is in a state of contraction right now according to domestic coverage, with The Israeli Cannabis Magazine reporting that “after a record of over 140,000 patients in January 2024, in the last six months the number of medical cannabis license holders in Israel dropped by about 8% to 128,355 as of today, the beginning of July 2024.”
