South African cannabis operation grows amid remote mountain setting

Imagine growing up in the mountains, where fresh air always blows gently and water remains abundant and pristine, all while a beautiful sun shines brightly for most of the year. This must be how the plants feel at Beyond Buds, a South African cultivator. The company set up its hybrid grow houses in the mountains to stay true to its mission: all natural, in nature. Yet, setting up such a thing wasn't exactly a walk in the park, as Roy Ingle, co-founder of the company, says. "We knew this would be logistically very difficult to pull off - setting up a farm away from the city, at altitude. But we knew everything this environment provides would show in our products, and differentiate us."

Growing at altitude
When the Beyond Buds founders were looking for a site for their grow, the popular option was warehouse conversions in the inner city and industrial areas. "They were dealing with a lot of bad air in those areas," he points out, "which just makes a tough job tougher." Thus, they decided to go for the more counterintuitive solution - which, in any case, made the most sense: setting up a farm in nature, somewhere far from any possible polluting agents or contaminates, no matter the cost. "We were going to do this even if it cost us more - that's what we ultimately wanted…mountain air, sweet water & African sunshine".

Beyond Buds' cultivation is based on a concept Roy and his business partners call HIGH: hybrid indoor grow house. "We've created the term ourselves. It's a solid wall structure, but the big difference is that our roof opens (letting in sunlight but containing air) and tracks the sun throughout the day. The bulk of the energy for the facility comes from sunlight, with LEDs providing supplemental lighting. We are 100% convinced that allows us to have a completely different range of terpene and cannabinoid profiles. Our plants are infused with fresh mountain air and water, and African sun. That's what this is all about."

From breaking ground to licensing, it took them around 12 months. Luckily, their founder member & partner is a successful miner and they could rely on a lot of earth-moving equipment, which helped clear the site quickly. The cement platform spanned over 8,000 square meters, but they only began operating on 2,000 square meters. "We knew we were going to expand, so we started small, but set ourselves up for the future."

Expanding one step at a time
The very first harvest from Beyond Buds sold out entirely. That allowed the company to expand further, pushing the operation to 4,000 square meters. When another cycle also sold out completely, the company was able to push their limits again, occupying the full extent of the 8,000 square meters initially planned. Now, the company has 6,000 square meters of cultivation space and 2,000 square meters of Mother/clone nursery space.

In addition to the extra grow space Beyond Buds made a considerable investment in their future with a solar plant, currently providing 1.5MW of power, with an additional 1.5MW of solar still to come on line. "Energy security is essential to ensure consistent harvest success, and sustainable power is in line with our 'nature first' war cry", says Roy.

With cultivation taking place in coir filled grow bags that are replaced at the end of each cycle (five per year), Beyond Buds have invested as much as possible to make the operation as efficient as they could, in order to drive the cost of the final product down. This also involved pheno-hunting and proprietary genetics, which keep them free from paying any royalties. "Our genetics are a collection of global favourites that come out of Amsterdam and California, combined with African landraces." The genetics they eventually selected for their bank are based on the Emerald Cup classification spreadsheet, specifically focusing on three areas: wake up, manage pain, and sleep. "If you think of these three, WAKE is the clear, energising sativa, PAIN is the strong hybrid, and SLEEP is the heavy, body dropping indica. In terms of THC levels, they range from 21 to 29%. But more than basic cannabinoids, it's the complex terpene profiles that provide the flower with it's unique characteristics, and medical benefits, certainly not just THC or CBD."

Following their principle of being in nature and staying natural, maintaining a low carbon footprint and so on, Beyond Buds has been able to consistently produce and sell out every harvest. "Quality cannabis for me is, first and foremost, consistency," Roy points out. "People want medicine to be consistent. We always make sure to tell our guys to deliver the same consistent products across at least six months - average duration of a medical script. The second aspect of quality cannabis is genetics that deliver. With that, I mean deliver everything we are after: yield, terpenes, cannabinoids, and bag appeal. Some people focus on bag appeal/nose, but for us, it needs to do its job medically, and it needs to be grown and cured in such a way that it ultimately provides a pleasant experience to the final consumer - our patients."

EU-GMP coming, but more is cooking
Things aren't slowing down for Beyond Buds, as EU-GMP certification is on its way by the end of May. "It's one of the most exciting things for us. It's been a very long and expensive operation, but it will put us in a unique position in South Africa, as not many farms are EU-GMP at all. This will allow us to pack patient facing finished goods, in addition to bulk, in our facility, thus improving our margins - it's simply going to change the game for us."

Beyond Buds has been trying to change the game even prior to getting EU-GMP certification by providing the medical market with innovative products to meet the tastes of different types of consumers. The playground for that has been Australia. "It all started when we had to shut down for the solar power expansion," Roy explains. "We couldn't grow for 12 months. We looked at what was in our safe other than flowers, and we found a bunch of kief, trim, and popcorn buds." It's crucial to point out that Australia, even though it is a medical market that very much resembles Europe, is more open to medical cannabis product innovation & variety. Beyond Buds decided to capitalize on that. "We were one of the very first, if not the first, to put a 'popcorn' (smalls) product in the Australian market. Today, there are more than 10 different popcorn brands." Roy points out that he very much appreciates the openness of the Australian medical cannabis market, whereas Europe is more traditional and historically moves a little slower. "We have recently signed a partnership with a local EU-GMP laboratory which allows us to send finished products (vapes, tinctures, capsules, powders, etc.) and bulk oils (isolates & distillates) to Europe and Australia. Together with our laboratory partners, we have developed a unique, measured dose kief pillule which we excited to take to market in Q3 2025. Even though flower/bud represent 75% of our sales, we are excited about the future and where innovation will take us.