Medical marijuana facility's approval delay frustrates mayor

Officials in theCampbelltonarea are urging residents toput pressure on the federal government and Health Canada to accelerate the licensing process for medicinal marijuana facilities.

Zenabisbought an old warehouse in March and promised to hire 400 people to work in its medicinal marijuana plant.

The facility will be located in northern New Brunswick, a regionhard-pressed for jobs. So far, 1,400 people have applied to Zenabis to work for the company.

The plant was supposed to be operating in the fall. But Zenabis still doesn't have its federal licence to produce marijuana for medical purposes.

Health Canada has received 1,100 applications from would-be producers across the country. Only 22 have been approved to date.

Atholville Mayor MichelSoucy and the president of the local chamber of commerce staged a news conference Monday outside the Zenabis plant.

They are calling on people to put pressure on on the federal government and Health Canada to speed things up.

Soucy said they want all of the proper security checks to be done properly but he wants to know why it is happening so slowly.

"But can we accelerate a bit the file so we can give what the people are expecting from this company Zenabis creation of new jobs and good jobs for the area," he said.

Rgis Maltais, the president of the Campbellton Regional Chamber of Commerce, said the project has a lot of local support.

Maltais said all local mayors are endorsing the project.

"In the past year, I've been talking a lot to the business community," Maltais said.

"Our next step, if this doesn't work we'll have to get the business community involved and the population involved. So we'll have more people, more letters going to the minister."

An early supporter of the Zenabis plant was Aboriginal Affairs Minister Bernard Valcourt, who is the local Conservative MP.

Valcourt expressed his support when Zenabis announced its plans, but hasnot been available to comment on theprogress of the company for the last few months.

Statistics Canada's three-month average for the unemployment rate in the Campbellton-Miramichi region was 13 per cent in September, the highest of any region in the province.