Cannabis: parliamentarians want more flexible regulation of CBD

Shops that sell products from CBD (food products, oils, cosmetics, e-cigarettes, infusions, flowers to smoke or inhale, etc.), to which relaxing virtues are attributed, are flourishing in the region: France has nearly a few. 400 today, almost four times more than two years ago, according to the Professional Hemp Trade Union (SPC).

But these traders may be liable to prosecution and cannot obtain supplies from French producers of hemp (used in particular in textiles and construction) under French law which, under the 1990 narcotics decree, prohibits to exploit the leaves and flowers of the plant which naturally contain CBD, the non-psychotropic molecule in hemp.

“Guarantee total safety for the consumer”

Because, according to the authors, CBD is “the collateral victim of the essentially safe approach to cannabis in our country” and suffers from its cousinhood with “narcotic” cannabis (with a high content of THC, the psychotropic molecule). To get out of this situation, lift the brake on the economic development of the sector and “guarantee the consumer total safety” on products from CBD, the parliamentary information mission on the uses of cannabis formulates, in its report published this Wednesday, twenty proposals.

The authors recommend in particular “the authorization of the cultivation, import, export and use of all parts of the hemp plant for industrial and commercial purposes, including the flower”. The mission also wants the threshold of 0% THC in finished products to be removed and another maximum to be defined for hemp crops, “ideally 0.6%” and 1% for overseas territories. -sea located in warm latitudes.

A THC content of less than 0.2%

Unlike several European countries, France only authorizes the cultivation and marketing of hemp fibers and seeds, provided that their THC content is less than 0.2%. Finished products (foodstuffs, etc.) must be free of them. However, the French regulations were deemed illegal on November 19 by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) in the name of the free movement of goods, unless the risk to public health invoked by France “appears to be sufficient established “.

The CJEU also ruled that CBD had no psychotropic or harmful effect on health, and that it could not be considered as a narcotic, nor as a medicine. “This parliamentary report is going in the right direction. France, which was in a particularly damaging situation, will be able to gain a foothold in this new sector, and try to make up for the delay it has accumulated so far, ”reacted to AFP Aurélien Delecroix, president of the Professional Union hemp (SPC).

European Court of Justice: relief for French CBD sellers