In mid-July, a group of Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) announced their plan to push for a hemp legal framework for the European Union. The hemp industry in EU member nations has evolved significantly in recent decades, and policies and regulations have failed to evolve with it.

Many nation-level hemp laws and regulations differ from country to country, in addition to often conflicting with EU-level policies. The current push for a more uniform regulatory approach to industrial hemp in the EU includes increasing the THC threshold for industrial hemp. According to a recent poll conducted by the German Cannabis Business Association (BvCW), raising the THC threshold for hemp is a very popular concept.

“In our non-representative survey conducted from August 26, 2025, to September 1, 2025, we asked: “How would you rate a Europe-wide limit of 0.3% for the THC content of industrial hemp?”” BvCW stated in its recent newsletter (translated from German to English).

“Forty percent rated 0.3% as much too low, and another 47.5% as rather too low. Thus, 87.5% favored a higher limit. Only 2.5% considered the value just right. None of the respondents considered the limit too high. 10% answered “don’t know.”” stated BvCW about the poll’s results.

Maximum THC thresholds for hemp production vary around the globe, ranging from .2% THC to 2%. Exceeding a THC threshold for hemp harvests can result in farmers losing entire crops, which is obviously not optimal.

A better regulatory concept that was proposed by leading hemp expert Morris Beagle, President of We Are For Better Alternatives, during a panel discussion at the recent International Cannabis Business Conference in Berlin, is to enforce a THC limit at the product level.

Rather than place the burden of meeting a THC limit on farmers, which is not an easy standard to meet given all of the variables involved, the burden to meet a THC threshold limit would instead be placed on product makers, which is considerably easier for them to do comparatively.

During a separate presentation at the International Cannabis Business Conference in Berlin, leading international cannabis industry economist Beau Whitney, founder of Whitney Economics, provided data demonstrating that the value of the global industrial hemp industry could be as much as $456.2 billion.