South Dakota’s budding hemp and medical marijuana industries are complicating law enforcement’s ability to enforce cannabis prohibitions.

That’s according to the 2022 Hemp Report, released last week by the South Dakota Attorney General’s Office.

“In 2022 the testing requirements associated with industrial hemp had a clear effect on law enforcement’s ability to continue to prosecute illegal cases of marijuana and/or controlled substances,” Attorney General Mark Vargo wrote in a single-page report that was sent to Gov. Kristi Noem and the South Dakota Legislative Research Council on Nov. 29. “The legalization of medical marijuana has a greater impact on the prosecution of these cases than the early stages of the legalization of industrial hemp.”

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