Australia makes cautious entry into medicinal marijuana market

Melbourne

AT a secret location in Australia's south-east, Peter Crook delicately tends to a two-month-old cannabis cutting.

Barely knee high, it is one of about 50 government-sanctioned "mother plants" to be cloned for future generations of crops for the country's fledgling medicinal marijuana industry.

"I think we'll see Australia punch above its weight, both in agriculture research as well as medical technology," says Mr Crook, chief executive of Cann Group, the firm granted Australia's first commercial grower's licence. "As different conditions come online we are going to see the market grow rapidly."

Following Canada, Israel, and more than half of the US states, which through varying approaches have le…