After President Donald Trump signed the Agriculture Improvement Act of 2018 into law, the Food and Drug Administration the FDA must figure out how to regulate CBD in food and beverage products across state lines.
The new law changes certain federal authorities relating to the production and marketing of hemp, defined as cannabis and derivatives of cannabis with extremely low (less than 0.3 percent on a dry weight basis) concentrations of THC. These changes include removing hemp from the Controlled Substances Act, which means that it will no longer be an illegal substance under federal law. Rocky Mountain High Brands President and CEO Michael Welch just joined the U.S. Hemp Roundtable Board of Directors..
He said this is the equivalent of the end of Prohibition, but the FDA is not really practicing what it's preaching.
“How they’re going to come up with a process of allowing companies to stay within the regulations and be able to include it as an ingredient in food and beverage products,” said Welch. “The basically have prohibited companies from adding CBD to any food and beverage products and then transporting those products across state lines.
Although, he understands that was intended for companies that are promoting curing cancer or epilepsy, but it still hurts other companies that don’t make those promises.
Texans for Responsible Marijuana Policy Director Heather Fazio agrees it's an historic move.
“In Texas we have the Compassionate Use Program, which essentially is now rendered irrelevant because of this passage of the new law,” said Fazio.
She said they'd like the program more inclusive to bring patients access to the rest of the cannabis plant that's excluded from the law.
Fazio understands it’s important to have safe products for consumers.
“But, we have to make sure that we’re not allowing overregulation to dominate the market and create barriers to entry that would otherwise be unnecessary,” said Fazio.
This might also open the door for banks which haven’t been eager to work with cannabis-related business because of federal legality of the products.