State cannabis and hemp programs create new program opportunities for farmers and underlie the emerging cannabis economies.  Billions of dollars flow through that aggregate economy, while states learn on the fly.  In many cases, by watching other states. 

New York has taken an approach we think that will be more common in the future, to group all of cannabis under one regulatory umbrella, the Cannabis Control Board.  The state is rewarding existing hemp farmers by making select producers – those that have grown hemp for 2 of the last 4 years – eligible to grow recreational MJ.  From

Assembly Majority Leader Crystal Peoples-Stokes told the publication,