'I'm A Scientific Cultivator': Meet Ignacio Peralta, The First Cannabis Cultivation Post Doctorate In Argentina

By Hernán Panessi, Via El Planteo.

One thing led to another. On that balcony in the Caballito neighborhood of Buenos Aires, there was nothing but bricks, concrete and the view of another balcony. Despite growing up in the heart of the city, the horizon of young Ignacio "Nako" Peralta was inevitably tinged with green.

"When I was a kid, I didn't know any plants," Peralta, the first postdoc in cannabis cultivation in Argentina, says today.

As a teenager, while he was dodging cannabis dealers, Ignacio came into contact with the plant and went, in a decade, from smoking bricked cannabis to producing exportable flowers that have won international prizes and awards.

A connoisseur of the true story behind the many fables of cannabis, Peralta, considers this part of his story as an added value: "I am not just a scientist, I am a scientific grower or a scientist grower," he says.

A spiritual calling

His life changed in 2016 when, midway through his doctorate in medicinal plants, he heard the call of Valeria Salech and her fellow members of Mamá Cultiva, a local grassroots organization that advocates for the access of epileptic children to cannabis oil. "They were advocating for the law [of medicinal cannabis] and were looking for professionals committed to the cause," she recalls.

Something happened to him, something vibrated, succumbed inside his chest. "It felt natural to combine my practical experience as a grower with the scientific method, in pursuit of a social cause: improving people's quality of life," he acknowledges.

Meanwhile, in those first meetings and talks with Mama Cultiva, Peralta realized that there was something else going on, that he had to participate. "I want everyone who needs cannabis to be able to count on quality treatments like the ones I had when I was a kid."

"We talked about epilepsy treatment when we discussed the bill. I am an epileptic too, so I empathize with the mothers. As epileptic, I know the benefits of pharmacology when it comes to providing quality treatment," he says.

With the ruling of Law 27.350, which enabled medical and scientific research of the medicinal use of the cannabis plant, Dr. Peralta reaffirmed his mission: he wanted to formalize the study of cannabis within the University of Buenos Aires and CONICET (National Council for Scientific and Technical Research), his training institutions.

A larger industry
His experience as a biochemist and his doctorate (Ph.D.) in Biochemical Sciences specializing in Phytomedicine placed him in a strategic position to pursue his mission. As a doctoral fellow, he joined forces and began to carry out the first cannabis project financed by CONICET in which he researched cannabis Sativa and its potential as a medicine.
"I took on the task of teaching and disseminating what was known at the time," says Dr. Peralta.

In 2018, he traveled to California to finish his Ph.D. thanks to a grant he obtained from the Argentine Ministry of Education and the Fulbright Commission, from the United States.
His object of study? The Jarilla, a branching shrub found in the mountainous areas of western Argentina.

"In California, I realized that there was another industry that exceeded the medicinal," he reveals. The explosion of the recreational industry caught his attention.

Charting a path

Peralta quickly returned to Buenos Aires with the firm conviction to apply for a postdoctoral fellowship. He wanted to formally study cannabis cultivation and extraction.

-How was applying for a scholarship to do a postdoctorate in cannabis?

-The scientific rationale was there. My background, too. At that point there was no scientific discussion: facts are facts. I received very good support from the institute. They granted me the scholarship, they financed a big project. The bureaucratic part was complicated, the permits to work with cannabis. The first six months of my postdoctoral fellowship were pure paperwork. I was institutionalizing threads of cannabis research at the University.

-Being the pathfinder through that bureaucratic process, contributed to the presence of more doctoral fellows studying cannabis today?

-Yes, the project contributed to the presence of more doctoral fellows in cannabis. The IQUIMEFA (Institute of Chemistry and Drug Metabolism) is positioning itself, getting permits to obtain raw materials, importing inputs. We obtained the authorization for the first university cultivation. It could not be carried out because of the pandemic, but it had to be done. It had to.

-And professionally, what did it mean to be the first postdoc in cannabis in the country?

-It meant an enormous opportunity to combine 15 years of cultivation with 15 years of a scientific career and the enormous possibility of working directly with the plant that I love and that I am passionate about. I am doing basic science applied to production. It also gave me the opportunity to travel to countries where cannabis is more developed. And it was a finishing touch to my career as a research fellow.

Peralta for export
In any case, his experience at CONICET was highly valued at the international level and ended up opening the doors to the industry. "I have been well received," he confesses, "because the industry needs research and development since, thanks to applied science, Argentina has an opportunity to stand out in this global industry."

Meanwhile, looking to gain experience in large-scale cultivation, for 2019, Dr. Peralta traveled to Santa Marta, Colombia, to study the company's Avicanna cultivation. "The experimental laboratory culture is not the same as the raw material."

And he continues: "In Colombia, I lived a continuous learning experience. The company made its crops and laboratory available to me. I was able to learn a lot from professional growers and we exchanged a lot of knowledge. It was an introduction to large-scale production and field research".

In Colombia, he wandered for six months, writing field trials on large-scale pharmaceutical- and organic-grade production. "I wanted to understand how environmental and agronomic management variables affect the production of active ingredients."

What are the trials about? From his learnings: more investment does not always result in higher productivity; tutoring, in addition to preventing plant loss and damage, modulates cannabinoid production; more nutrients do not always result in more cannabinoids, and he developed a method to determine the right time to harvest using chromatography to study cannabinoid biosynthesis.

The publication of these trials is imminent.

Better cannabis

Later, in 2021, with this new experience under his belt, Nako traveled to Uruguay to work as a master grower. "I had the task of setting up a smokable CBD flower production from scratch. There I was able to validate many of my ideas in a large-scale commercial crop".

After a semester in Uruguay, Peralta returned to the country to form a technical-scientific consultancy together with three colleagues.

"My colleagues, besides being teachers and researchers of great trajectory, have international experience in the industry. We intend to accompany the industry through our knowledge and expertise in all research, production, and development processes," he says. The project, called NPR (Natural Products Research), is tentatively scheduled to be launched in April 2022.

-What are your challenges going forward?

-I would like to continue learning and contributing what I know. Also, I would like to produce higher-quality cannabis every time, a better joint for everyone, and, consequently, better medicine. I want to stay connected to the plant, continue to learn from it. And that we can do it in a legal context of growth and fairness for all. There are still people suffering from it while we are making a living from it.

Photo courtesy of Avicanna Inc AVCNF.