Greenfern Industries gains approval to have shares quoted on NZX main board

Managing director Dan Casey. Photo/ Supplied

Greenfern Industries Ltd has gained approval from the NZX to have its shares quoted on the NZX main board.

Greenfern industries Ltd operates in the medicinal cannabis, hemp and hemp food space. The shares will be listed from 11am on Thursday, October 21.

Greenfern will be the third listed company in the region.

Managing director Dan Casey says this was another major step forward for Greenfern Industries.

"Together with our team of staff and advisers, we have been working towards this goal for the past 12 months. It's an incredibly exciting day for us. We are really pleased that we have been able to attract significant capital as well as appoint a very strong board of directors to complement the business assets and the plans that we have."

He says being listed on NZX will enable the company to attract new capital.

"We can explore growth opportunities such as further developing products and establishing additional commercial relationships here in New Zealand and Australia, and with overseas wholesale markets."

Greenfern will have 84,300,384 shares on issue at 25c per share and is expected to have an implied market capitalisation of just over $21 million on listing.

Greenfern has grown through two crowdfunding rounds that raised more than $4.8m. The company raised an additional $2.155m from wholesale investors earlier this year and now has over 1980 shareholders.

In May, Greenfern was named New Zealand's first Toitū carbon zero certified cannabis and industrial hemp organisation.

"The medicinal cannabis industry has quite a large environmental and carbon footprint due to high energy inputs. We want to be a world-leading example of sustainability in the industry and to help set the standard for environmentally friendly cannabis and hemp production," Dan says.

In December 2020 Greenfern purchased the hydroelectric power station on the Waingongoro River that runs alongside their Taranaki research facility, indoor growing operation and processing facility.

"The highest overhead in growing medicinal cannabis indoors is the cost of lighting and environmental control. Greenfern has a significant benefit in having access to power at cost rather than wholesale or retail.

"This is a game-changer for us in either allowing us to produce at a lower cost or create a larger margin on sale price. And we're able to grow our plants in a more environmentally friendly way – that's really important to us."

Greenfern has introduced a number of sustainability measures including the way in which it processes its hemp as efficiently as possible.

Their hemp seed is processed and sold for use as a high protein meat substitute while byproducts from the seed processing are also used in other products such as their hemp-based body care range, MaTo, and hemp-based beer CannaBeer.

The company is also setting up a high-tech aeroponic grow room at its Taranaki headquarters which is intended to use less water, fewer nutrients and less electricity compared to conventional hydroponic cannabis grow rooms.

As part of Greenfern's plans to list on the share market, a team of experienced and skilled directors have been appointed. The board is chaired by Brent King, an experienced public company director who has extensive knowledge of capital markets. He is the managing director of General Capital Ltd.

"There are significant opportunities in this sector, and we are working hard to take advantage of them because if companies in New Zealand do not take these opportunities we will simply become importers like we are in many other industries," Dan says.

A copy of the company's NZX listing profile is available on Greenfern's website gfi.nz.