The Food Standards Agency (FSA) confirmed last week, in a virtual meeting with the Association for the Cannabinoid Industry (The ACI), that they intend to stick to their deadline of 31 March 2021 for CBD companies to have a validated Novel Foods application. According to the FSA. “After this date, only products for which the FSA has a valid application will be allowed to remain on the market.”
After speculation the FSA would extend the deadline for all UK businesses, The ACI arranged a meeting to clarify several points to enable us to guide our members, and the industry at large.
The FSA made clear that
- They will not consider extending the deadline of 31 March 2021 for CBD companies to have a validated* Novel Foods application in order to remain on the UK market.
- They made it clear that they would not consider changing the regulations they outlined in their statement made in February 2020.
- They confirmed that they are currently receiving high quality dossiers from CBD companies wishing to keep their products on the UK market.
*A “validated” Novel Foods application is the first step, and a prerequisite, to gaining an authorised Novel Foods application. The FSA do not expect companies to have a fully authorised Novel Foods application by 31 March 2021.
The ACI welcomes this clarity from the FSA and will continue to work with our members to ensure they understand everything they need to know to keep their products on sale in the UK.
If you are a CBD company operating in the UK these regulations will effect your business. It is now clear that if you do not have a validated Novels Foods dossier by 31 March 2021 you will not be able to legally sell your products in the UK.
The ACI’s team of experts will work with all our members to ensure they submit robust Novel Foods applications to the relevant authorities in the UK and EU in a timely fashion. Due to the amount of data required to create a credible dossier, and time taken to generate this data, The ACI experts advise companies to start this process now, in case they have not yet already.
