LUXEMBOURG (CN) — CBD is not a narcotic, the EU’s high court ruled Thursday, finding a French ban on the hemp plant extract illegal.
The decision from the Court of Justice of the European Union could lay the legal groundwork for a legal market for CBD, short for cannabidiol, in the 27-member political and economic union.
“The CBD at issue in the main proceedings does not appear to have any psychotropic effect or any harmful effect on human health on the basis of available scientific data,” the five-judge panel wrote.
The court was asked to determine if a French law banning the import and marketing of CBD, grown legally in other EU countries, violated regulations guaranteeing a single European market. The European Single Market, the foundation of the EU, guarantees that goods, capital, labor, and services can move between any of the member countries without restrictions. But there is an exception for narcotic drugs.
Sébastien Béguerie and Antonin Cohen-Adad, identified in court documents as B.S. and C.A., launched their cannabis e-cigarette company Kanavape in 2014. To produce the first electronic cigarette with CBD, they imported organic hemp plants processed in the Czech Republic to France, where their startup was based.
However, the company was shut down by the French government before it even opened its doors. Despite being the EU’s largest producer of hemp, most of which is cultivated for textiles and paper, France has some of the EU’s strictest laws against cannabis. Marijuana is banned and CBD can only be made from the seeds and fibers of the plant, not the flowers, and can contain no THC, the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana.
Béguerie and Cohen-Adad were convicted of drug charges in 2018, sentenced to 18 and 15 months suspended imprisonment, respectively, and were ordered to pay a 10,000 euro ($12,000) fine. The pair appealed, and the French appeals court referred the matter to the Court of Justice.
Thursday’s decision affirms an opinion from a court adviser earlier this year. Advocate General Evgeni Tanchev wrote in May that Kanavape’s products should be allowed to move between EU countries because CBD isn’t considered a narcotic drug.
Citing the lack of ‘recognized psychoactive effects” and noting that CBD has “little or no effect on the central nervous system,” the Luxembourg-based court determined that “CBD cannot be classified as a narcotic drug.”
The EU high court also ruled that CBD cannot be regulated as an agricultural product because it is not considered raw hemp, as it is not harvested, or “retted or scutched hemp” because the extradition process does not involve separating fibers from the rest of the plant.
In an emailed statement Thursday, Béguerie said the ruling “creates immense hope for our community and the French CBD and hemp industry.”
“It’s a great relief from a personal point of view. It has been six years since I have been the subject of heavy criminal proceedings in France and since I was forced into exile in the Czech Republic,” Béguerie said.
The case has been closely watched by cannabis advocates, who have touted CBD’s health benefits. The substance is legal in most EU countries and before July, it was regulated as a “novel food,” as it is typically consumed in candies, cookies or other food products.
However, the European Commission backtracked over the summer and said all nonmedical hemp extracts should be considered narcotics. The EU’s executive body is waiting for a decision by the United Nations before making that change final.
Next month, the UN Commission on Narcotic Drugs, the body that decides drug policy, is planning to hold a vote on whether cannabis and related substances should be removed from the Single Convention on Narcotics Drugs and the Convention on Psychotropic Substances. Those treaties determine how drugs are regulated worldwide.
The Court of Justice left the door open for France to keep its CBD ban if “the real risk alleged for public health appears sufficiently established on the basis of the latest scientific data available at the date of the adoption of such a decision.” The French court will now make a final decision in the case.
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