Canada’s cannabis jobs market is growing like, well, a weed. A recent story from Bloomberg claims: 34 out of every 10,000 employment postings in Canada are related to cannabis. Cannabis was fully legalized in Canada back in October, and in the build up to legalization, plant-touching businesses added 1,100 jobs between EOY 2017 and legalization. So, what canna-jobs are in demand in the Great White North? Let’s have a look.
Producers Are Looking For Able Bodies
No surprise here, but cannabis producers and growers are looking for manual labor. People to clip and harvest flower at production greenhouses are in high demand. According to the Bloomberg story, Aphria –who made headlines earlier in 2018 for a partnership with US-based Souther Glazer– had to dispose of ~14,000 plants back in August due to a lack of timely harvesting. Talk about harshing a vibe! Canada’s eight largest producers are in the market for approximately 1,700 more new jobs as cannabis production ramps up.
While automation may hurt some numbers, there’s always a demand for skilled manual labor to handle fragile buds and flower. Additionally, with consumer tastes shifting more and more steadily towards rendered products such as edibles or vape oils, employment demands for skilled labor should continue to prosper.
R+D and STEM Jobs Are In Demand
While suppliers and producers looking for manual labor should come as no surprise, many plant-touching businesses are also looking for people with backgrounds in STEM and research and development. Similar to how canna-job markets in US states that have legalized, Canada is also seeing employment opportunities within industries that are not traditionally associated with cannabis such as: data crunching, banking and accounting, and importing and exporting.
One industry that’s most surprising? Canada’s huge, but volatile, gas and oil industry. With so much uncertainty in the futures markets and the subsequent employment dips less oil demand can lead to, canna-companies in the Prairie Provinces are even seeing applicants from that lucrative space. Aurora’s chief corporate officer, Cam Battley, explains to Bloomberg “There’s no question were one of the bright lights in the Alberta economy.” And Battley is one-hundred percent correct to state that. As cannabis production continues to expand and as more and more countries reevaluate their cannabis laws, Canadian companies like Aurora, who briefly flirted with Coca-Cola earlier this fall, Canopy Growth, Cronos, et al will stand to benefit from an expanding workforce and expanding revenues.