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Village Farms International congratulates Netherlands on cannabis program milestone

(Globe Newswire) Vancouver, B.C. and Orlando, Fla. – Village Farms International, Inc. congratulates the Netherlands on its historic progress to the next phase of its legal recreational cannabis program. With successful completion of the start-up phase of the Dutch Program, the Netherlands has expanded the number of municipalities, in which regulated cannabis can be sold in “coffee shops,” from two to 10.

Through its majority owned subsidiary, Leli Holland, Village Farms holds one of ten licenses to cultivate and distribute recreational cannabis legally under the Dutch Program. Production at the company’s first facility in Drachten is scheduled to start in the fourth quarter of 2024, with sales to start in the first quarter of 2025.

“The Netherlands is a core part of our expanding international cannabis program, which includes both recreational and medicinal markets. We look forward to building on our unmatched success in Canada to contribute high quality, innovative and safe cannabis products to the Dutch Program when we enter the recreational market there early next year. In addition to our Netherlands production, we are leveraging our position as one of the few Canadian producers with EU-GMP certification for other existing European markets and new opportunities as they unfold,” said Michael DeGiglio, president and CEO of Village Farms.

The Dutch Program is scheduled to operate for a minimum of four years with the potential for national expansion. The total supply requirement for the ten approved producers participating in the Dutch Program is specified by the Netherlands government to be approximately a minimum of 65,000 kilograms of dried flower annually. A brief description of the Dutch Program can be found at Controlled Cannabis Supply Chain Experiment | Government.nl.