AI And Cannabis: Will Artificial Intelligence Affect the Cannabis Industry?

• Brands across the cannabis industry are already leveraging AI in an increasingly competitive landscape.
• However, there are still a few untapped opportunities for cannabis innovators to leverage AI to build a forward-thinking cannabis community.
• At the end of the day, communities are made up of and support people. The human elements of the cannabis industry are still critical, and people won’t be taking a backseat to AI anytime soon.

Text generators, bespoke digital art, and even algorithm-generated tunes—AI is only becoming a more powerful force in our everyday lives. But will AI impact the cannabis industry?

It already has.

Cannabis innovators are leveraging AI for cultivation, product recommendations for patients, business licensing, and so much more. However, there are still untapped opportunities where AI could shine.

At the end of the day, people are still the backbone of the cannabis community. While AI has made great strides in the marijuana market, machines won’t be replacing passionate caretakers, healthcare providers, or advocates anytime soon.

This is just the tip of the iceberg. For more on the changing AI landscape in the cannabis industry, read on.

Current AI Innovations in the Cannabis World

Let’s start with some current AI applications that medical marijuana patients, cultivators, business owners, and others are already using.

Cultivation

In many cases, AI can cut through the noise, refine data into actionable steps, and make processes more efficient. All of these applications offer a world of optimization opportunities to the cannabis cultivation sector.

Today’s cultivators are already using AI to:

• Maintain growing conditions – Cannabis grown on a large scale must be consistent—so, it has to grow under consistent conditions. But manually maintaining temperature, humidity, light level, and airflow in growing environments can be taxing. AI can pinpoint environmental fluctuations and make changes to compensate in an instant.
• Optimize costs – Like any other agricultural product, cannabis takes ample natural and human resources to produce. Humans can leverage AI to automate both menial and high-level tasks, freeing up time (and resources) for the most pressing tasks.
• Mitigate growing challenges – Pests, mold, and diseases—any of these can spell disaster for a large-scale growing op. Using high-tech sensors and cameras, AI platforms can monitor plants for threats and alert human growers to potential challenges in the greenhouse.

Product Recommendations

While you could certainly turn to generative programs like ChatGPT for cannabis product recommendations, how do you know the recommendations will be based on real-world patient data and anecdotal evidence?

One brand is already meeting the need for an educational, marijuana-specific recommendations platform: Jointly.

Jointly’s new generative recommendation AI (called Spark) can direct patients toward strains, administration methods, and complementary therapies that could help them meet their medical cannabis needs. In short, this exciting platform could expand cannabis knowledge (especially for newcomers or skeptics).

Clinical Research

While medical data about cannabis is only growing, researchers are already trying to improve their study outcomes with help from AI tools.

Take a recent Penn State study, for instance. Researchers built an AI to:

• Map how (and where) cannabis compounds interact with bodily compounds
• Identify reactions, cellular pathways, and other biological responses to cannabis
• Predict physiological responses based on these movements and biological processes
• Identify potential therapeutic interventions aimed at specific targets inside the body

Needless to say, this is an impressive application of an exciting AI—one that could powerfully change the way the medical industry views (and, more importantly, uses) cannabis as a natural medicine.

Cannabis Business Licensing

In light of increasing legalization nationwide, cannabis businesses are popping up left and right—the marijuana economy is only growing.

Right now, one company is leveraging AI to help new cannabis businesses meet regulatory requirements, get licensed in their respective jurisdictions, and hit the ground running in a red-hot market. Oddysee AI is a consulting platform that combines both machine and human power to kick weed startups into high gear.

Started by a consulting firm that used exclusively human labor in its infancy, Oddysee AI has helped over 100 businesses get the licenses they need to operate legally and safely (no matter their industry niche).

This will, hopefully, only benefit the community as a whole. More thriving cannabis businesses in our economy could lead to:

• Improved patient access to products, information, and services
• Increased awareness of the therapeutic power of cannabis
• Positive changes in public opinion (that could improve policies and approaches over time)

Prospective Applications for AI in the Cannabis Industry

Despite the above developments, there are still some empty, prospective AI niches in the cannabis industry. While the ideas below are just a taste of the possibilities, these patient-centered concepts could help more therapeutic users get access to the all-natural healing they so deserve.

Patient Outreach

Many medical marijuana patients come to this treatment option as a last resort—they’ve exhausted their options in the Western medical model, grown tired of treating the symptoms of their conditions (instead of the root causes), and given up on finding lasting healing.

But what if marijuana healthcare providers could reach patients before they hit rock bottom?

AI could be leveraged for novel patient outreach that could introduce people to all-natural relief as a first-line treatment instead of a last-ditch effort. What might that look like?

• Provider education – Unfortunately, many healthcare providers aren’t in the know about the therapeutic benefits of cannabis. By leveraging AI as a learning tool specifically for clinicians, our industry could encourage more providers to talk to their patients about cannabis treatment.
• Early intervention – AI could also be a powerful follow-up or early intervention tool in specific healthcare contexts. For instance, after visiting a mental health clinic, patients could receive informative materials from an AI introducing them to cannabis as a care option. Finding patients who are ready to heal and giving them the tools to do so is a must for our community.

Education

Why is our community in such dire need of patient outreach initiatives in the first place?

• Lack of knowledge – Simply put, the idea that cannabis can be used as a therapeutic tool is still novel—and somewhat unfamiliar to large patient populations.
• Stigma and fear – Marijuana has been the subject of an unfair, deceptive propaganda campaign for decades (despite being used as a medicine for centuries).

People who use cannabis (or show interest in it) are often met with intense social stigma as a result. Reasonably, people fear the potential social isolation they may face if they choose an all-natural treatment route.

To correct both of these trends, we need to improve our education efforts. Putting science-based facts about cannabis in the hands of patients is the key to reversing decades of misinformation and stigma.

Leveraging AI to fact-check claims about cannabis on social media, for instance, could be a step in the right direction on the education front. Our industry could use AI to spread facts instead of fear.

The Human Element: An Irreplaceable Part of Cannabis Culture

Of course, there’s a key part of the cannabis community you simply can’t replicate with AI: the real people who keep this industry (and community) alive.

Our growing field will always depend on people like:

• Medical cannabis clinicians – Compassionate, empathetic providers can be the difference between high-quality care and dead ends for patients. We’ll always need informed, non-judgemental doctors and nurses to help patients find long-term healing.
• Advocates – Legal and health experts who work tirelessly to defend patients’ rights to heal with natural medicines are the driving force behind legislation and positive change.
• dispensaries workers – Budtenders and medical marijuana pharmacists don’t just help you choose products and swipe your card: they’re repositories of knowledge, they welcome newcomers to our community, and they connect patients with life-saving medicines.

AI might be the latest in a long line of high-tech developments in the cannabis world, but don’t worry: our industry and community will always be sustained by experts, patients, and allies.

TeleLeaf: A Human-Powered, Forward-Thinking Cannabis Care Network

The cannabis landscape is ever-changing—how can patients get the care and cannabis knowledge they need to heal in this fast-paced industry?

By finding a cannabis-informed, non-judgmental, and patient-centered medical marijuana healthcare provider—like one of TeleLeaf’s licensed cannabis clinicians.

Our providers can help you get a medical recommendation for cannabis, apply for a medical marijuana card, and customize your all-natural treatment plan to unlock long-term recovery.

Ready to get started? Make an appointment with us now.

Sources:

MJ Biz Daily. AI Is Making Cannabis Cultivation Smarter.
https://mjbizdaily.com/artificial-intelligence-ai-is-making-cannabis-cultivation-smarter/

Forbes. Weed-GPT: A New AI Platform Helps Cannabis Customers Learn “What’s Right for Me?”.
https://www.forbes.com/

Penn State. AI-Based Mapping of Complex Cannabis Extracts in Pain Pathways.
https://pure.psu.edu/en/projects/ai-based-mapping-of-complex-cannabis-extracts-in-pain-pathways

Bloomberg. Cannabis Startups Try AI for Everything from Dabbing to Driving Tests.
https://bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2023-05-01/chatgpt-and-weed-oddysee-marks-start-of-ai-marijuana-startups/

The University of Sydney. History of Cannabis.
https://www.sydney.edu.au/lambert/medicinal-cannabis/history-of-cannabis.html