Key agreement between Asterion and Watpac signed this month

A multinational construction giant has signed on to Asterion’s Toowoomba cannabis farm project. Here’s what it means for the project timeline.

The company behind a multimillion-dollar medicinal cannabis farm outside Toowoomba has signed a key agreement with global construction giant BESIX Watpac.

In a statement, Asterion confirmed it had entered into a binding Early Contractor Involvement contract for the construction of the planned $400 million first stage of the project.

Asterion director of communications and business development (Australia) Dave Holland said the agreement would allow for an accelerated process to get final designs that could be used to build the facility.

In parallel with that, Asterion plans to start civil works in the second quarter of 2021, ahead of finishing the full project design, Mr Holland said.

“One of the things that we liked about Watpac was that they’ve got a good track record at procuring locally in regional centres,” he said, pointing to the company’s work in Roma, Longreach, and more recently in Townsville.

In a statement, Asterion said the first phase of the project would include the first of four 10-hectare glasshouse and auxiliary facilities for tissue culture propagation, research and development, processing, and all other associated support functions.

Asterion chairman and CEO Stephen Van Deventer said it was an important and exciting milestone for the company, and it was looking forward to beginning construction of “what will be one of the world’s largest state-of-the-art medicinal cannabis facilities, projected to produce more than 500,000kg of dried cannabis flower annually for the Australian and global markets.”