UK soon will sell first commercial export of high-CBD cannabis from Colombia

(This is an abridged version of a story that appears on the Marijuana Business Daily International website.)

The first CBD products exported from Colombia to the United Kingdom soon will be available for sale in the U.K. and other European Union countries, Bogota-based Clever Leaves announced.

The health-related products, which were exported as a food supplement, reached London’s Heathrow Airport and cleared customs Aug. 31.

The products are manufactured using low-THC cannabis as raw material, have a considerable CBD content and are sold without a prescription.

Colombia does not use North American-style distinctions between hemp and marijuana.

Instead, Colombia defines cannabis products as “psicoactivo” (psychoactive) and “no psicoactivo” (“nonpsychoactive”) and has fewer controls on the cultivation of cannabis with less than 1% THC.

Another company with Colombia could be on the precipice of exporting CBD.

Pharmacielo, a Canadian-based cannabis company whose main operations are in Colombia, announced July 25 it “completed the necessary permitting process required to enable Colombia’s first commercial export and sale of nonpsychoactive (CBD) isolate.”

The company did not specify when the first products would be shipped. However, Pharmacielo on Aug. 1 announced it has boosted its production capacity.

Companies that want to manufacture CBD isolate or other CBD products in Colombia using their own crops as raw material must be licensed and use registered genetics.

Alfredo Pascual can be reached at [email protected]