A month and a half ago, the first phytotherapy master’s pharmacy in Ecuador and the region opened its doors. On Luxemburgo and Portugal streets, in the heart of the financial center, you can see a poster promoting the various products he sells, all based on the cannabis plant.

There is a small museum of cannabis inside, and people who come to the place can buy their products, but also, as in the former pharmacies, products that health professionals send to be made according to their master recipes, whose goal is to cure numerous diseases.

Master recipes are personalized formulas based on different medicinal plants, including cannabis. The new pharmacy is part of a more comprehensive project called Mayu, which was born in 2009 and which mainly dealt with three areas: research and medicine, well-being and education, always around the cannabis plant or marijuana. It is called Mayu (eternal flow), a reference to the flower of life.

At the pharmacy, Lizbeth Fajardo, in charge of the Mayu commercial area, explains that six products are currently being sold, such as tea, CBD dropper, gummy candies, chocolate, face serum and beauty serum.

In addition, at least 50 products have already been created through master recipes.

The pharmacy is one of the final links in the cannabis chain that is growing stronger in Ecuador after its therapeutic use in the country was decriminalized in 2019.

Julio Vicencio and Lizbeth Fajardo show products from the Maya Research Center. Photo: Alfredo Cardenas.

Lizbeth Fajardo says there are currently two ways the industry is opening up. Mayu buys cannabis leaves for her tea from the farm. Also an extract for cosmetic creams. They produce their products in their factory in Amaguaña. But they also constitute the services of a chocolate company.

However, for the creation of master recipes, imported extracts are used, for example from CBN, because they must meet certain standards. Fajardo, who is also the president of the Ecuadorian Association of the Cannabis Industry (Asecanna), explains that what the industry is looking for is that in the future farms meet all the parameters to be able to produce within the country.

He says that at the moment, citizens’ interest in this type of product is growing, but he also recognizes that there is a certain stigma towards the plant, that it is related to addiction problems, but that in reality it can be used as a complete pharmacy, because it has 200 components that can generate a number of products for the treatment of various diseases.

Julio Vicencio, who is the naturopathic doctor in charge of the Mayu medical area (which cares for patients with various pathologies), comments that the plant’s possibilities are endless. He explains that, since the existence of the human endogenous cannabinoid system, which regulates 300 vital functions, such as cardiac, muscular, but also stress and happiness, was discovered, the conclusion was reached that cannabis is only a plant species that can interfere with our system to stabilize our mood. These products could also help, for example, with fibromyalgia, which, according to Vicencio, has been identified as a malfunction of the cannabinoid system.

On the issue of education, Mayu has supported the development of formal education and there is a degree in Therapeutic Use of Medical Cannabis and Endocannabinology, which has already graduated 300 students. This is supported by American University. Technical specialization for sowing, cultivation and extraction of non-psychoactive hemp and hemp was also developed.

Products such as chocolate or gummy candies and even tea can be consumed without problems. But other products like CBD itself, supplements, their dosages and what to use them for should have expert advice. The basic step is to check whether these products have a sanitary register.

The prices of the products, according to Fajardo, are affordable: