These 3 jobseekers want to work in the cannabis industry. Here's why.

What does it take to find work in Canada's emerging marijuana industry?

On Tuesday, Canopy Growth Corporation the global cannabis company behind Smiths Falls-based Tweed Inc., one of the country's largest producers of medical marijuana held a job fair at the Brookstreet Hotel in the west Ottawa community of Kanata.

• Tweed shrugs off competition from marijuana home growers
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From smiling university graduates to white-haired retirees, CBC Radio'sOttawa Morningmet some of the people who felttheir skills would be a perfect fit for the industry, as the federal Liberals prepare to legalize cannabisin 2018.

Their replies have been edited for length and clarity.

Cassie Downton

"Currently, I work with pharmaceuticals in the supply chain. I deal a lot with narcotics and have been keeping an eye on the medicinal cannabis industry for a while and seeing the roles it could fill within our medical industry. It's something that's interested me.

"I would be looking for a job working as the link between Health Canada and Canopy. It's so new, the regulations. We know them for pharmaceuticals and narcotics and controlled substances, but with marijuana we're trying to figure everything outstill. It'd be a really interesting job to grow as this industry's growing.

"It's hard to kind of tell people that you're coming for a job for a company that grows marijuana and then being told 'Hopefully you don't get any free samples.' It's hard to kind of get people to take it more seriously as a medicine, as opposed to a recreational kind of activity."

Michel Villeneuve

"What really caught my interest with this organization a few years ago was just the name Tweed, just the branding of Tweed, and just the way they were looking at medical marijuana and making it more civilized and accessible to people. I find the organization extremely professional.

"I'm a retired civil servant federally, but my career was in national parks. I was a park warden most of my career and I finished my career working at the national office in Gatineau. I would say a lot of my experience is with public safety dealing with public safety issues in national parks, wildlife conflicts, avalanches. I've done a lot of work with people and have that compassionate side [which]attracts me to the medical marijuana industry because I feel there's a lot of benefits there.

"Being the second country in the world to legalize it is a great big step forward for us, and I think it's going to allow the industry to continue research and development and doing a lot of work on the medical side of it. Because anecdotally, things have been said for thousands of years about this plant and I think there's a lot of truth in a lot of those anecdotes. I think it's only going to benefit everyone as it continues to grow."

Kara Turner

"I wanted to come out today because they're expanding business, and especially in the marketing field [which] is where I have expertise and it's my passion. ... I currently work for the town of Smiths Falls, so I'm familiar with the community and I'm in the process of redoing the brand and logo for the town of Smiths Falls. I'm the lead person who communicates with the company taking over the logo and website, so I'm very familiar with marketing, branding, promotional, website, all that type of stuff.

"Growing up, you do have those certain perceptions [about marijuana]. But it's evolving in the medical field, so it's not something I'm concerned about. It's more about teaching the community and people the benefits of what marijuana has to offer in this day in age ... my dad's a doctor and my mum's a nurse so they're very familiar with this whole industry. Smiths Falls has embraced it. We're a very open community to new ideas."