MISSOURI – Despite being a newcomer to the cannabis industry, Missouri topped a new report showing its impressive rise in cannabis sales within the first six months of 2024.
The Green Market Report shared that Missouri came in fifth for adult-use cannabis product sales by July 2024. Missouri joined the top performers with $709 million in sales, beating Colorado by $30 million.
In Missouri, recreational use of cannabis was legalized in November 2022 and possession of the drug became legal in December 2022 for adults 21 and up. The following year, in February 2023, sales for legal adult-use cannabis began.
The report was released a couple weeks before Missouri Gov. Mike Parson signed an executive order Thursday banning the sale of hemp-infused products with “psychoactive cannabis compounds.” The ban would prohibit the sale of these products unless purchased from an “approved source.”
The order comes after Parson says there has been a recent rise in children nation-wide becoming hospitalized due to psychoactive cannabis products.
The Green Market Report only calculated the purchase of adult-use cannabis, which paved the way for recreational use of the drug. According to the report, many states that are only legal for medical marijuana purchases still produced large sales numbers.
In Illinois, the state produced $847 million in recreational cannabis sales, placing it in third. Illinois has legalized the purchase of cannabis for recreational use since January 2020.
Topping the list California produced over $2 billion in cannabis sales, while Michigan followed behind with $1.6 billion.
