British Food Standards Agency To Publish CBD Guidelines
The regulatory agency is about to release a guide of legal CBD products in the UK market
Sometime in the next few weeks, the British Food Standards Agency (FSA) will publish details about the CBD companies and products allowed to remain on sale in the UK market.
The move comes as 210 applications for CBD products are still in consideration. Late last year, the FSA claimed that the reason this document is almost 9 months late is because of the ‘quality of applications” was lower than expected.
It is now expected that the FSA will potentially issue several documents. One is a public list of validated products, the second is a list of applications for products likely to be approved.
While it is a frustrating process for all involved, it does create, at last, a formal regulatory and approvals infrastructure for CBD products specifically.
This puts the UK ahead of several other countries at least on a regulatory front. This includes Germany, where CBD is still technically regulated under the German Narcotics Act (although CBD products are on sale in the country). It also includes Italy and France, which just issued national guidelines for the cannabinoid on December 31.
What Next?
The decision by the FSA could be the regulatory peg that the developing industry in-country hangs its hat on. This will, for the first time, allow a conversation to proceed that well may become the first regulatory schemata for the entire British industry. This in turn may help other cannabinoids, like THC, become more accepted.
So far, tragically, on the THC front, the British government has put the brakes on including medical cannabis as a covered prescription under national healthcare. As a result, the only medical cannabis available in the country is imported and further, not accessible to anyone who cannot afford both the medication and the prescription costs.
The Future of The British Cannabis Industry
It is unlikely that moving events on the continent are going to pass the UK by. Germany has just announced its intention to move forward with full boat recreational cannabis. Luxembourg, Malta, and presumably Luxembourg will all move forward in this year. Beyond this, the French have finally begun to accept CBD as a legitimate cannabinoid.
It is unlikely the Brexited British will sit this one out entirely.
How fast further reform will come, however, is still very much in the air. The silver lining of this cloud, however, is that cannabis reform has moved another step forward in the UK.
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