Mca Head – By Kisean Joseph
Mca Head Moves Educate
With the Antigua and Barbuda Cannabis Festival weeks away, the head of the Medicinal Cannabis Authority (MCA) is using the lead-up to do what he says the industry needs most — educate.
Regis Burton, Chief Executive Officer of the Medicinal Cannabis Authority of Antigua and Barbuda, outlined the full scope of the MCA’s regulatory framework during a recent interview, offering one of the most detailed public explanations to date of how the island’s medicinal cannabis industry is structured, licensed, and overseen.
According to Burton, the MCA is the statutory body responsible for introducing cannabis into Antiguan society for medicinal, sacramental, and scientific purposes — in a manner he described as responsible and standards-driven. The authority issues licenses, regulates activity, and monitors compliance at every stage of the supply chain
That supply chain is extensive. Burton outlined a licensing menu that covers virtually every stage of the plant’s life cycle — cultivation, extraction, manufacturing, transportation, dispensary operation, importation, exportation, research and development, and laboratory testing. Each of those activities requires a separate license and operates under MCA oversight
Underpinning the entire system is what Burton described as a seed-to-sale tracking mechanism — a digital framework through which every licensed product can be traced from the point of cultivation to the point at which it reaches a patient. That traceability, he argued, is what fundamentally separates the regulated medicinal industry from the black market.
“In the medicinal industry, cannabis is grown, and the product is developed under some level of standards,” he said, noting that black market cannabis carries no such assurances — leaving consumers unable to verify what chemicals have been applied, how the product has been handled, or whether it has been contaminated.
The MCA’s remit extends well beyond the industry itself. The authority has rolled out education programs targeting police, customs officers, and tourism-sector workers, and has more recently extended those programs to schools. The upcoming festival, Burton said, represents the next phase of that outreach — four days of education, experience, and industry showcase scheduled for April seventeenth to 20th.
He said the authority currently oversees four licensed dispensaries on the island, and that the system is designed to flag and investigate any patterns of misuse — including patients attempting to access quantities beyond what their patient card authorizes.
For Burton, the festival’s timing is deliberate. An industry that has been evolving since 2018, he said, is one that the public deserves to understand fully — and the cannabis festival is designed to make that understanding accessible to everyone.
Further information on the Medicinal Cannabis Authority, including licensing resources, is available at mca.gov.ag.
