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If you’ve read much about CBD, you’ve probably heard about the importance of third-party lab reports. But have you ever wondered why this is even necessary? And why it is so essential for customers to do their research when it comes to CBD companies?
At Kanibi, one of our core principles is being transparent with our customers. And one of the most important aspects of that transparency has to do with the testing of our products. Read on for the background on this important practice.
Simply put, a third-party lab report shows the results of a lab test on the purity of a product.These tests are usually done in house as well, but having an independent lab perform the test gives customers confidence that results haven’t been doctored in any way.
(Just to clarify a bit of terminology, the lab reports that come from independent labs are also called Certificates of Assurance, or COAs.)
There are a number of independent labs that do this kind of testing. At Kanibi, we have partnered with ProVerde Labs for our third-party testing. They are one of the leading testing facilities in the U.S., and their lab reports are user friendly andeasy to read.
Some companies require customers to contact them if they want to see lab reports,but at Kanibi we want to have as few barriers as possible to this information. For that reason, you’ll find our updated COAs on all our product pages.
As of now, the CBD industry is still unregulated in the U.S. That means that no governmental agency is acting as a watchdog to ensure that products contain the amount of CBD the label says they contain.
The independent testing results we post on our website are evidence (from an outside source) that we are acting in the best interest of our customers.
First, it’s important to keep in mind that the CBD industry is still in its infancy. For several decades before the signing of the Farm Bill of 2014, it wasn’t even legal to grow hemp in the U.S. (This is especially weird to think of since hemp was one of the staple crops in this country for centuries before people started getting spooked by recreational cannabis use.)
But as soon as hemp was legalized, the CBD industry exploded and the market was flooded with cheap, low-quality CBD products (as well as some really good, high-quality ones). This made it very hard, if not impossible, for customers to discern which companies were selling legitimate,high-quality CBD, and which ones were just in it for a quick buck.
At that time, though, the legal status of CBD was still somewhat in question. The language of the 2014 Farm Bill was just ambiguous enough to keep CBD in a gray area. In fact, the Drug Enforcement Administration wasn’t really convinced that the 2014 Farm Bill was enough to remove it from their purview.
And when it came to regulation, the FDA wasn’t going to get involved with a substance that hadn’t been explicitly legalized.
Of course, that explicit legalization did eventually take place with the 2018 Farm Bill. This bill was extremely important to the CBD industry for lots of obvious reasons. But one implication is that, in the future, CBD products may be regulated by the FDA.
That still hasn’t happened though.
Well, with one exception. In 2018, the FDA did approve one CBD product — Epidiolex. This CBD prescription medication is meant for difficult-to-treat epilepsy. The fact that the FDA did give its stamp of approval to this medication may be a sign of more to come. But it also raises questions about how the FDA will regulate non-prescription CBD products in the future.
At the present time, the CBD industry is in a sort of regulatory limbo. The substance has been explicitly legalized by the 2018 Farm Bill, and CBD has become an enormous economic force both in the U.S. and globally.
But while the FDA has expressed its intent to produce some kind of regulatory framework for the CBD industry in the future, they have yet to create any regulatory guidelines for the industry.
So, right now, customers need to be protected from the bad actors in the industry. Third-party testing is a way that companies can voluntarily adhere to high standards of transparency, giving customers confidence that they’re getting what they’re paying for.
In an otherwise unregulated industry, it’s pretty hard to overstate the importance of independent testing. There’s really no other way for customers to know what they’re buying.
Right now, the FDA is still in the information-gathering phase. On May 30, 2019, the agency convened a meeting to solicit input from stakeholders in the industry. And in March 2020, the FDA issued a report to Congress that provided some broad outlines of what regulation might look like in the future.
But the agency seems to be a long way from being ready to reveal a regulatory framework for the industry.In the words of theU.S. Hemp Roundtable (a hemp advocacy group), “the agency’s delay results in the worst of both worlds — U.S. hemp farmers are denied profitable markets for their crops, while unregulated products continue to proliferate, with no safeguards for public health and safety.”
Given this current state of affairs, at Kanibi we’re going above and beyond when it comes to transparency.We want you, our customers, to know what you’re getting and to feel confident that we’ve got your back.
For this reason, we’ve put two lab tests forour products on their product pages. This makes it super easy for customers to check results before buying. If you have any questions about the tests themselves, be sure to reach out to customer service!