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Czechia – a land flowing with beer, honey, and hemp, a land promised to cannabis research and hemp business. Do you not believe it? Then you should have taken part in a trip to selected Moravian and Czech universities and companies together with a delegation from Lithuania, which came here in November 2025 to establish contacts for further cooperation.
The delegation came at the invitation of the CzecHemp cluster and was led by cannabinoid specialist Rokas Augulis from the Lithuanian company Naturas. He also proved to be a super active trader in raw hemp materials – during the few hundred kilometers spent in the car, he arranged the sale of several tons of seeds, biomass, and extracts to destinations around the world. They do not waste time and resources in Lithuania!
Olomouc laboratories and greenhouses
A bastion of hemp science such as Olomouc could not be missing from the list of destinations, so after being welcomed in Prague, the Lithuanians’ first steps led them there. At the Czech Advanced Technology and Research Institute (CATRIN), they were welcomed by Associate Professor Petr Tarkowski.
He showed the visitors the technical facilities shared by the local institutions, from Palacký University to the Ministry of Agriculture and the Czech Academy of Sciences. The visitors were fascinated not only by the academic mega projects but also the local mini-hives – small wooden containers in which bees, calmed by liquid nitrogen, are transported to greenhouses to pollinate the plants there.
Practical research in Šumperk
Next destination was Agritec, a company located on the outskirts of the Šumperk city, near the enticing Jeseníky Mountains. The round table was attended by Marie Bjelková, head of the Department of Legumes and Industrial Crops and therefore also a hemp specialist, and Prokop Šmirous, director of the company.
The members of the delegation who belonged to the Lithuanian hemp association Kapvia were particularly interested in the possibilities of phytoremediation – soil purification using hemp. Doctor Bjelková presented a detailed analysis of cadmium and lead absorption by hemp, but surprisingly enough, the results showed that oilseed flax, for example, has a better accumulation capacity.
The hundreds of cannabis clones in agar culture medium are used to study environmental influences.
However, Bjelková also highlighted another fiber crop – stinging nettle. In collaboration with the University of Hamburg, they are currently researching nearly sixty of its genotypes in Agritec. Not only their phytoremediation effectiveness is being tested, but also the use of the nettle fiber in a similar way to flax and hemp. Nettle fiber is characterized by high strength, low elasticity, and a pleasant sheen, making it suitable for the production of clothing and technical textiles, ideally in combination with cotton, bamboo, or synthetic fibers.
The debate was very informative and far-reaching, concluded by a visit to the local hemp nursery – a room with hundreds of cute hemp clones. The organic gems of Šumperk!
Helping Hands in Brno
The whole trip was conceived by CzecHemp president Hana Gabrielová, who, despite being primarily a hemp advocate, did not forget to include prevention and treatment. So the next stop was the headquarters of the Brno-based organization Podané ruce (Helping Hands), where we were welcomed by former Czech national drug coordinator Jindřich Vobořil.
The icing on the cannabis cake was a tour of selected cultivation rooms, where dignified mother plants and their vital offspring basked in the warmth.
His fact-filled presentation convinced even the most skeptical academics from Lithuania that cannabis is a medicine that reduces harm rather than causing it. Vobořil explained how substance substitution works and how cannabis, among other things, alleviates the side effects of traditional pain treatment. Opiates cause constipation, nausea, and delirium, but when administered together with cannabis, more effective suppression of pain symptoms is possible.
Among other things, he explained the concept of psychomodulatory substances, which was partially fulfilled on November 12, when kratom began to be sold in a regulated manner in licensed brick-and-mortar stores in Czechia. This ended its clandestine sale in vending machines near schools, which was particularly unfortunate given that it is a highly addictive substance, as it acts on opioid receptors. HHC and other semi-synthetics were not legalized, as they had since been blacklisted by the UN. Their sale in our country is therefore restricted.
Grow rooms at the university hospital
Unsurprisingly, the most fragrant facility was a branch of the St. Anne’s University Hospital on Výstavní Street in Brno, where molecular biologist Václav Trojan’s team runs the local cannabis growing facility. The hospital participates in teaching students at Masaryk University’s Faculty of Medicine.
Dr. Trojan noted that the journey since 2013, when cannabis was legalized for medical use in the country, has been marked by many mistakes, but we were constantly learning from them. Thanks to this, Czechia is now one of the most progressive countries in the world in terms of the practical use of cannabis in medicine and the legality of its cultivation. The members of the delegation were thus able to see what university crops with high THC or CBD content, supplied to patients in Brno, look like.
Vobořil’s presentation convinced even the most skeptical academics from Lithuania that cannabis is a medicine that reduces harm rather than causing it.
Lithuanian visitors learned about Czech medical cannabis system, in which patients must have one of the legal “indications” – i.e. diagnoses – in order to gain access to dried flowers or extracts prescribed by specialists and covered by insurance. The icing on the cannabis cake was a tour of selected cultivation rooms, where dignified mother plants and their vital offspring basked in the warmth.
Newly elected MP Trojan promised to support clinical research into the effects of medical cannabis. Such studies are lacking in the country due to their financial demands. For the advocates of using cannabis in medicine, this was the most interesting stop on the tour.
Pharmacists at Masaryk University
The Moravian-German father of genetics, Gregor Mendel, once discovered the laws of heredity at the Augustinian monastery in Brno, where he also cultivated hemp in the local garden (as we know from his preserved herbarium entry of Cannabis gigantea). So after visiting Café Mendel at the monastery, we were headed to the Faculty of Pharmacy at Masaryk University.
The Institute of Molecular Pharmacy, where our editorial staff member and pharmacist Martin Helcman is employed, dazzled us with its many laboratories, where students and doctoral candidates diligently study the inner workings of our favorite plant. The hundreds of cannabis clones in agar culture medium are used to study environmental influences, for example.
Lithuanian hemp growers and interior designers were impressed by demonstrations of work with composites and a wide range of technologies.
This faculty is also where a public course Cannabis in Health and Disease is undertaken regularly. A number of our readers and colleagues have already participated in this course. We are looking forward to the next session at Masaryk University!
Composites in the forests
Our visit to Útěchov, where forests are teeming with mushroom hunters at this time of year, was also fascinating. It is home to the Josef Ressel Research Center, which is part of the Department of Wood Science and Wood Technology at the Mendel University Faculty of Forestry and Wood Technology in Brno. It is the first domestic research center for the study of wood as well as materials made from hemp.
Lithuanian hemp growers and interior designers were impressed by demonstrations of work with composites and a wide range of technologies, including a chamber for artificial aging of wood, a special microwave line, and a thermal modification laboratory. A fascinating fact: the materials in question are not only examined chemically or microscopically, but also acoustically! A special studio at the department allows for research through listening.
Factory in Tábor
The fourth day of the excursion was dedicated to a visit to a factory whose motto is “We separate the grain from the chaff”. JK Machinery in Tábor, South Bohemia, has been cleaning, sorting, shelling, and grinding seeds of crops including hemp for three decades. To this end, they manufacture the necessary equipment, designing and supplying complete technologies.
However, the usefulness of such machines depends on the size of fields growing hemp, which is still heavily dependent on subsidies. Are there enough such fields in the country to make it worthwhile?
Hemp in Lithuania: Why the stigma?
This Baltic country used to be the largest kingdom in Europe at the end of the 14th century, stretching from the Baltic to the Black Sea; today it has a population of 2.9 million. Although hemp was once an established crop here, Lithuania was the last country in Europe to allow the cultivation of industrial hemp in 2013; until then, it was illegal. The original permitted limit was 0.2% THC, and since 2022 it has been 0.3%. Until 2021, cannabis products were not allowed to contain any THC at all. Cannabis treatment and recreation are not permitted (although some patients obtain their medicine through Germany).
The permitted THC limit in industrial hemp in Lithuania has been 0.3% since 2022.
THC has been banned since 2017, which is a unique thing in the whole world. CBD is legal, but under strict conditions. Since 2018, it has been possible to prescribe synthetic cannabinoids, but no preparations are available in pharmacies. However, the Lithuanian company Biosyyd is currently the only company in the Baltic states and one of few in the entire EU that has the right to produce and supply CBD as an active ingredient for the pharmaceutical industry.
Conclusion: Let’s be proud in Czechia
Arguably, one of the most striking characteristics of Czech people is their tendency to grumble, complain, and whine. However, the field trip with friendly and inquisitive Lithuanians, who are interested in Czech hemp industry and open to closer cooperation, made it obvious to me that we Czechs have a lot to be proud of. For many experts from abroad, we are a model country leading the cannabis peloton.
The local advantage is not only the high standards of technical equipment, which are the results of successful subsidies and ambitious projects, but above all the countless experts who do their jobs with great erudition and enthusiasm.
Note: Are you an industrial or university subject interested in collaboration with Lithuanian companies and scientists? Let us know, we will connect you with them.
