Legislators in Colorado are debating on whether they should allow certified organic labels to be placed on cannabis products. Since organic standards are regulated federally by the USDA, and cannabis is still illegal federally, there isn’t much that stops a commercial producer of cannabis to claim that it is entirely organic even if it isn’t.
Colorado State Rep. Jonathen Singer is sponsoring a bill that would make Colorado the first state to officially regulate organic labeling for cannabis products. “Consumers have a right to know what they’re putting into their body,” Rep Singer said. This bill doesn’t actually set the standards for organic products though, it only instructs the state agriculture department to ask a third party to draft the proper regulations.
Earlier this year heath authorities in Colorado seized thousands of plants from producers based on suspicion of using chemicals that aren’t allowed on the plants. The majority of them turned out okay, but several had misleading names which made the products sound organic.
Larisa Bolivar, head of the Cannabis Consumers Coalition, says “That misleads people. We don’t want to wait for someone to get sick. You need to know that when something says organic, it’s organic.”
This bill is only a first step in establishing a need for cannabis products to be properly labeled. Other states will likely bring forth similar proposals as the cannabis market in both the US and Canada continues to grow.