Cheeba Cannabis and Hemp Academy’s Trenton Birch says the Gauteng Agriculture Department’s funding of a training programme that failed to get off the ground was to be expected because it was not properly planned.

He was reacting to news that the DA is investigating a R20 million grant to Silver Tree cannabis farm on the West Rand to train 200 prospective cannabis farmers. The money appears to have been advanced to Silver Tree via the Comprehensive Agricultural Support Programme (CASP) with the backing of both the national and provincial agriculture departments.

Oversight visit revealed 'nothing to show' for R20 m govt funding

The Democratic Alliance in Gauteng, which conducted an oversight visit to Silver Tree’s Tarlton cannabis farm at the end of April 2025 found no evidence of any training programme. DA MPL Bronwynn Engelbrecht says the party will take the matter up with provincial agriculture MEC Vuyiswa Ramokgopa.

In an interview with The Citizen on 2 May 2025, Birch, who has seen over 5 000 people receive training through Cheeba’s range of courses since its inception six years ago, said the project failed because it hadn’t been thought through.

“Again, this comes down to, sadly, typical government projects. Why would you give a medical cannabis farm money to train 200 farmers? A medical cannabis farm is designed to cultivate medical cannabis under very strict conditions. You would not train people on a medical cannabis farm… Do they have training experience?”

Birch has been critical of Government’s fragmentation and lack of focus in driving cannabis reform forward

“They must give money to the people that understand how to train, farms that focus on cultivation as their core. Let those who deal with cultivation train those who want to cultivate as well, because they are the right people. The problem here is that everybody’s trying to do everything, and everyone’s trying to grab everything. So, this is disappointing to see, but 200 farmers is a lot of farmers to train,” said Birch. 

'Setting up farmers for failure'

Hennie Venter, from Cannabusiness, said that while government’s intentions may be good, and that training 200 farmers was “a step in the right direction” but it didn’t address the systematic hurdles in cannabis regulations.

“We are setting these farmers up to fail. That’s the hard truth. This is where we believe technology, especially AI and large language models, can make a real difference.” 

“The issue isn’t a lack of capable farmers; it’s a system that locks out small farmers. Government needs to come up with a more inclusive model, and with this said, we’re currently using AI to help fast-track smarter, fairer and more inclusive regulations. Just imagine a WhatsApp chatbot that guides a farmer in Limpopo through licensing, in their language.” 

At the time of publishing, the Gauteng Agriculture Ddpartment’s spokesperson Joylene van Wyk had not responded to questions about the project.

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