A new study has shown that nearly six of ten Canadian neighborhoods are within five minutes of a dispensary. This is a clear indication of the accessibility consumers have to marijuana.
This study was done in collaboration by researchers from several universities and research institutes in Ottawa, Toronto, and Ottawa. It also revealed that only 7 percent of all retail cannabis stores were permanently closed over a span of four years.
Researchers collected longitudinal data on the location and status of all legal cannabis stores in Canada. They determined that there were 3,305 locations as of October 2022. The researchers then cross-referenced the dispensary location data with Statistics Canada’s “dissemination zones” definitions.
The study was published in Drug and Alcohol Review last Wednesday and was funded by Canadian Institutes of Health Research. It also looked at per capita sales and stores, as well as analyzing store closure rates and consumer access to retail.
The researchers found that per capita sales and per capita stores increased by an average of 122.3% each year over the past 4 years. However, there were larger increases in public and private systems (4.01x greater for per-capita stores and 2.46x greater for per-capita sales),” they said.
Research team noted that Canada’s legal marijuana market has “expanded tremendously” in the four years since legal adult-use sales were launched. There is also “considerable variation” in access between Canadian markets.
“The legal cannabis market in Canada grew tremendously in the 4 years after legalization.”
Statistics Canada reported that 90 percent of Canadians lived within a distance of 10km, or about 6 miles, of a licensed cannabis store prior to legal adult-use sales being launched in late 2018. According to the same analysis, only 35% of Canada’s population would live within the same distance as a planned cannabis shop for legal adult-use sales.
Numerous studies have shown positive results in areas where legal cannabis dispensaries can be found. A University of New Mexico study in 2021 showed that unemployment dropped in Colorado counties where dispensaries opened after legalization. This is in contrast to the counties where dispensaries were not open.
Another study, which was done in 2021, found that higher numbers of medical and recreational dispensaries were associated to lower opioid-related deaths, especially those associated with synthetic opioids like fentanyl.
A 2020 study examined Colorado’s crime rates before and after legalization. The researchers “observed an important reduction in certain types crime, namely property crime and simple assault in border counties of the Colorado region.”
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The post Most Canadian Communities Are Within 5-Minutes of a Marijuana Dispensary. Study Shows originally appeared on Marijuana Moment.
