France: the CBD war gets a boost

While CBD stores have operated in relative tranquility in recent months, with franchises rolling out their network all over France and many new brands online or on social networks, the last few weeks have seen a resurgence in store raids. CBD but also directly from online store customers. How to explain it?

Hope for the future...

Since 2018, the French authorities are officially not favorable to CBD companies. While the ban on CBD flowers is not legally based, they have always defended a strict vision of the legislative texts, even inciting regional prosecutors to intervene and close down CBD stores. The result has been an uneven crackdown across the territory.

These strong actions on the part of the State, with serious consequences for entrepreneurs, sometimes leading to prison sentences, have more often than not resulted in acquittals, after a judicial process that was ultimately pointless and costly for both taxpayers and the offending companies.

They have also prompted entrepreneurs to join forces, for example within the Syndicat Professionnel du Chanvre, and call for changes to the legal framework. Their first hope lay in the creation of a mission d'information (MI) on cannabis use, This was to lead to the creation of a regulatory framework for CBD in France. The coronavirus and governmental changes could, however, refuel the impatience that IM had soothed.

At the same time, the verdict in the Kanavape case before the Court of Justice of the European Union could, if it follows the the advocate general's recommendations, The new law would enshrine the free circulation of goods, and definitively authorize the import and sale of foreign products made from hemp flower. The latter would not immediately erase the ban on the production of the same products on French soil, but would allow entrepreneurs to work in relative serenity.

... and disappointments

However, these hopes have recently been dashed by numerous raids on CBD stores and customers.

Ingrid Metton, lawyer for a number of CBD entrepreneurs, confides to us that she «doesn't understand how procedures that infringe on the freedom to come and go or the freedom to do business are still possible, when we're in an unfavorable economic and regulatory context that's even less clear than before, with the Kanavape decisions and the conclusions of the information mission still pending. In France, the trend is towards regulation. I don't understand why we are now taking a step backwards, especially after the conclusions of the Advocate General of the CJEU».

She also describes new search methods and the many units involved:

• Customs or the Drug Squad, which are particularly interested in CBD flowers and resins
• the Directions Départementales de la Protection des Populations (DDPP), which inquire about the origin of CBD or flowers
• the Direction Générale de la Concurrence, de la Consommation et de la Répression des Fraudes (DGCCRF), which verifies the Novel Food status of certain products

As CBD has no specific regulatory framework in France, entrepreneurs are currently on their own in the face of these controls, without knowing what they are based on or what scope they may have.

A new development, however, is that a number of online store customers in Brittany, for example, have been surprised to find their purchases delivered by the customs authorities. The latter then offered them either to pay a customs fine, or to pass the case on to the public prosecutor, who would then prosecute them for alleged narcotics offences.

While these methods are reminiscent of the national fight against cannabis, In this case, it's about harmless hemp flowers that would flourish better under official regulation, to the detriment of French farmers who can't grow it, entrepreneurs who get sued, and consumers who often inherit low-quality products. So who wins in the end?