Another veteran cannabis attorney has criticized industry moves that are stoking fears in the American CBD market. Trade group the Hemp Industries Association (HIA) brought suit against the federal Drug Enforcement Administration over a recent DEA notice which would codify all cannabinoids derived from marijuana or hemp as Schedule I controlled substances.
Attorney Craig Brand told Ganjapreneur that the threat of a DEA crackdown on hemp CBD had been blown wildly out of proportion and encouraged industry groups to focus instead on the how the federal Food & Drug Administration (FDA) may regulate hemp-derived CBD in light of some “bad apples” in the industry. The FDA, for example, issued warnings last year to several CBD sellers regarding what it termed questionable health claims – leading to a slowdown in imports that hit European growers hard; fully half the CBD plant material grown in Europe – where hemp cultivation is fully legal – had been going to the U.S. market.
“I don’t necessarily see the DEA as the villain of the [CBD] industry,” said Brand, founder of Ganja Law and a 26-year veteran of narcotics case law. “The bigger danger is, when it does become legal, what is the FDA going to do with it?”
Well known cannabis law firm Vicente & Sederber also said recently that fears over a CBD ban in the USA are groundless.
