WASHINGTON – Eric Wang, vice president of the US Hemp Roundtable, encouraged the Legislature to include language in the 2023 farm bill that would regulate cannabidiol (CBD) and other non-intoxicating hemp derivatives as dietary supplements. Other speakers agreed at a July 28 hearing held by the House Biotechnology, Horticulture and Research Subcommittee on Agriculture.
The Agricultural Improvement Act of 2018, the latest farm bill, made it legal to grow and sell hemp in the United States. The US Food and Drug Administration, however, does not allow CBD, an extract of hemp, in food, beverages or dietary supplements because it is found in Epidiolex, an FDA-approved drug.
“The hemp industry has been greatly hampered by the Federal Food and Drug Administration’s slowness to create a regulatory pathway for hemp-derived cannabinoids, particularly cannabidiol,” said Agriculture Commissioner Ryan Quarles from kentucky “Without clear guidance from the FDA on products containing hemp-derived CBD, major retailers will not carry the products and many business leaders are reluctant to move forward with the development and manufacture of CBD-related products. This reluctance, in turn, it has decreased the industry’s demand for harvested hemp material.”
The uncertainty and lack of regulation affects both farmers and consumers, Mr. Wang, who is also chief executive of Ecofibre, a hemp technology company with offices in Australia as well as Georgetown, Kentucky, and Greensboro, North Carolina.
“Bad actors sell products without proper warranties and mislead consumers with false labels,” he said.
Hemp and marijuana are Cannibas sativa. US regulation defines marijuana as containing more than 0.3% tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). Hemp has less than 0.3%.
“We’ve heard a lot of great recommendations for the 2023 farm bill, and one I’d like to add is that the FDA has not had any kind of regulatory framework for hemp-derived CBD,” said a subcommittee member. Indiana Representative Jim Baird. “So I would encourage us to include that in our discussions on the 2023 farm bill.
Subcommittee chairwoman Stacey Plaskett, representative of the Virgin Islands, said: “Thank you, and I wholeheartedly agree with that assessment.”