Food Standard Australia and New Zealand (FSANZ) has given its approval of hemp products to be sold as food.

The bi-national government agency which administers the Food Standards Code has approved the sale of foods derived from low (and no)-THC hemp — the psychoactive component of cannabis.

With the exception of hemp seed oil the sale of hemp-based foods is currently illegal in Australia, but the legislation is being ignored or side-stepped extensively.

It is not the first time FSANZ has approved hemp products as food and the agency's principal advisor for product safety standards, Dr Leigh Henderson says the regulator has carefully considered its ruling on hemp-derived foods.

"Our approach on hemp seeds has been that they are safe, however, we have paid regard to some issues that have been raised by government stakeholders in terms of whether they'll be able to enforce a standard for hemp seeds and our approach has been to assist them in enforcing the safety of permitting sale of hemp seeds."

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Its latest ruling includes strict conditions around the addition of CBD [Cannabidiol], the medicinal component of cannabis, to ensure its not added into food products.

Before hemp can be sold as food in Australia it will need the approval of state and territory governments which could be given at a meeting of the Council of Australian Governments (COAG) in April.

Paul Benhaim, CEO of Hemp Foods Australia, a company which exports hemp-based foods but is unable to sell them in Australia, is confident the COAG meeting will produce a favourable outcome for the industry.

"The decision by FSANZ means it is very likely hemp foods will be seen on numerous food shelves in Australia very soon," he said.

"We have been manufacturing thousands of tonnes of hemp seeds for use as a food in northern NSW, but most of it is sent to Japan, Korea, North America, and Europe."

Mr Benhaim said there was now acknowledgement in Australia that low-THC hemp was not the same as illegal cannabis, and growing it would not pose an issue for law enforcement.

But, NSW Greens upper house MP Jeremy Buckingham is not as confident that COAG will approve hemp products as food.

Mr Buckingham said previously resistance to the legalisation of hemp-derived foods had come from health and police ministers in Victoria and New South Wales raising concerns about hemp's interaction with road-side drug testing.

"They've said there's a health risk, they've also said it could give false positives in term of mobile drug testing, there's absolutely no evidence for that anywhere in the world," Mr Buckingham said.

"All over the world people are rushing into this industry, and Australia is missing out because our politicians are stuck in the 20th Century."

The Tasmanian government has welcomed FSANZ's latest recommendation and said it would strongly advocate for approving hemp food products at the next Australia and New Zealand Ministerial Forum on Food Regulation.

It said it has provided the necessary State approvals through the Industrial Hemp Act and streamlined the licencing and regulatory processes, making it easier for Tasmanian farmers to grow industrial hemp.



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