The Rising Need for Quality Control Within the Cannabis Industry

The smart move would be for producers to treat their cannabis as if it were a pharmaceutical drug

With medical cannabis being legal in Canada since 2002, and recreational use becoming legal in 2018, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s promise to his country has caused a storm.

This legal framework has given Canadian companies the leverage to lead the cannabis industry to new heights. Not only supplying to Canada, companies have now seen an opportunity in Europe, where more countries are moving toward a less stringent approach concerning cannabis. The decision to move to more relaxed regulations even hit the United Kingdom in 2018, when the government legalized usage for medical purposes, joining countries like Germany, Denmark, Ireland, and Greece.

Despite what one’s view on this subject may be, demand is clearly extensive, with industry experts like Stephen Murphy, co-founder of Prohibition Partners, predicting the market will go “from zero to €56 billion (£49 billion) in a decade.”

…

Want to continue?

By logging in you agree to receive communication from Quality Digest. Privacy Policy.

Create a FREE account

Forgot My Password

Comments

The rest of your argument.

Cannabis is a bioremediator, an organism that soaks up toxicity from its growing medium. Cannabis can deliver these toxins (should they exist) to the central nervous system of the end-use consumer. Foremost, speaking from my research into recreational cannabis production, my chief concern is for "other ingredients" (some listed on product labels, most are not) in commercial-grade fertilizers, as well as chemicals Health Canada permits Licensed Producers of MJ to apply to cannabis plants under production. The concern stems from the fact that cannabis will be legal, by 17 October 2019, to consume through ingestion (e.g. "edibles," tinctures, and oils). My project concerns making the independent determination that the fertilizers (and their constituents) employed in the production of consumer-grade cannabis.

Take, for example, 20-20-20, a fertilizer used in cannabis production. Canada policy framework oversees this range of fertilization products. 20-20-20 contains 20% Nitrogen mass/volume, 20% Phosphorous, and 20% Potassium. Yes? N-P-K. This leaves 40% mass/volume of the contents of the bag. Are these "contents" required to be listed by law? They are not. Does the FDA know what these contents are? It does not. So what's the problem?

Recent and longitudinal research-1 indicates that nickel, mercury, lead, arsenic, and cadmium have been showing up in commercial- and consumer-grade fertilizers. What I propose is to make the determinations: i. that this is not occurring in Canada, ii. it is not occurring in cannabis production contexts, iii. that it is not occurring in cannabis production contexts that produce cannabis for human ingestion, iv. and to a greater degree, that safe alternatives to these chemicals/toxins (should they persist in products) be regulated into policies governing/approving pest control, and fertilizers "other ingredients," not simply for cannabis producers but especially in food crops policy formations. Cannabis consumers don't need to be eating nickel or mercury, or even lead.

The missing component

A very lucid and well thought out article. All of the concepts and ideas mentioned are contained within one international standard; ISO/IEC 17025:2017 General requirements for the competence of testing and calibration laboratories. The standard has requirements for quality control. What really is required to protect the customer is legislation requiring the analysis for this new product to be done by accredited testing laboratories that would be inspected on a regular basis. The requirement can be based on looking at cannabis as a pharmaceutical drug or more likely a food product. At least this way the quality component would be measurable.