Jamaican cannabis company wants to turn the Caribbean into the world's wellness capital
Key Points(5)
- JACANA, Jamaica’s leading vertically integrated wellness platform, recently announced that it is consolidating its skincare line, plant-based therapies, farm tours and retail shops into what it is calling the Caribbean Wellness Platform.
- The announcement formalizes what had been years of scattered growth into a single strategy — what the company describes as an "integrated wellness ecosystem." The bet comes as the wellness tourism industry is projected to more than double to $2.1 trillion by 2030.
- JACANA wants Jamaica, and the Caribbean more broadly, to capture a meaningful share of that growth as a destination known for natural healing, not just beaches.
- Everything traces back to a 100-acre organic farm in the hills of St.
- Ann, where JACANA grows more than 60 Caribbean botanicals — including ginger, turmeric, leaf of life, aloe vera and black castor oil — and manufactures products under organic, GACP and GMP standards for export.
JACANA, Jamaica’s leading vertically integrated wellness platform, recently announced that it is consolidating its skincare line, plant-based therapies, farm tours and retail shops into what it is calling the Caribbean Wellness Platform. The announcement formalizes what had been years of scattered growth into a single strategy — what the company describes as an "integrated wellness ecosystem."
The bet comes as the wellness tourism industry is projected to more than double to $2.1 trillion by 2030. JACANA wants Jamaica, and the Caribbean more broadly, to capture a meaningful share of that growth as a destination known for natural healing, not just beaches. Everything traces back to a 100-acre organic farm in the hills of St. Ann, where JACANA grows more than 60 Caribbean botanicals — including ginger, turmeric, leaf of life, aloe vera and black castor oil — and manufactures products under organic, GACP and GMP standards for export.
From there, the company has built four business lines that feed into one another: a botanical skincare range of balms, oils and other personal care products; a therapeutic line covering medical cannabis, functional mushrooms and other plant medicines; farm tours, retreats and workshops held on-site; and apothecary shops designed around browsing and education rather than quick purchases.
The company is leaning hardest into the skincare segment right now. Its Releaf Balm and body oils have become among its fastest-growing products and are already stocked in hotel spas across the region. JACANA is now pushing to place the line in more hotels and stores throughout the Caribbean.
Already in more than 100 hotels
JACANA's products are already sold through more than 110 hospitality and wellness brands, including Sandals, Marriott, Virgin, Rosewood, Auberge and Hard Rock. Its guest experiences have won TripAdvisor's Travellers' Choice Award for three consecutive years.
The company has partnerships in Jamaica, the Cayman Islands, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, the British Virgin Islands, St. Lucia and Barbados, and is now expanding into North American e-commerce and hospitality markets.
CEO Alerie Hull-Duhaney, a chartered accountant who previously served as Group Financial Controller at Seprod Group, leads a team of more than 90 people drawn from companies including J. Wray & Nephew, Johnson & Johnson, Novo Nordisk, PwC and Reckitt.
The company's board and advisors include venture capitalist Bill Tai, an early investor in Zoom, Canva and Twitter; former Microsoft CMO Mich Mathews Spradlin; Will Muecke, formerly Goldman Sachs' global head of healthcare investment banking; and former Coca-Cola executive Robert Leechman.
"JACANA began its journey with the cannabis plant, and the rigor it demanded built the foundation for something far bigger," Hull-Duhaney said, adding that the goal is to build "one of the defining wellness brands to emerge from the region."
Executive Chairwoman Alexandra Chong described the strategy as a bet on integration rather than any single product line. "It is a fully integrated wellness ecosystem where products become rituals, rituals become treatments, treatments become experiences, and experiences become lasting memories," she said.
Whether JACANA can compete with wellness tourism destinations that have decades of infrastructure and brand recognition behind them remains an open question. But with a trillion-dollar market up for grabs and Caribbean tourism already a proven draw, the company is staking its claim early.
