Kanavape: continuation and end

The CBD pioneers may have had a head start, but they were within their rights when they launched Kanavape, the first electronic cigarette to use hemp extracts. After 7 years of legal proceedings and a ruling by the Court of Justice of the European Union, the Court of Appeal of Aix has dropped all the charges relating to the merits of the case, and has retained only a personal charge against Sébastien Béguerie, for cannabis use.

Prosecuted in 2014 and sentenced in first instance in early 2018, Sébastien Béguerie and Antonin Cohen, the two co-founders of Kanavape, had appealed to the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) to find out, among other things, whether cannabidiol (CBD) was a narcotic and whether France could prohibit its import from one of the European member states if it had been legally produced.

The The CJEU has ruled that CBD is not a narcotic, that a member state could not restrict the free circulation of CBD-based products and that CBD could be derived from hemp flower. A slap in the face for MILDECA which went to great lengths to interpret legal texts restrictively and without any legal basis.

Today's decision by the Aix Court of Appeal is based on the CJEU ruling, and finds that :

• France cannot ban the CBD trade
• the presentation of Kanavape as a «medicine», which was used by the Ministry of Health as an argument to stop marketing Kanavape in France, was unjustified
• the facts of incitement to the use of narcotics for the relay of clinical studies on Cannabis are not proven

For Antonin Cohen: «This will help protect public health by giving French citizens access to CBD products that fall within the scope of the regulations. It will also improve the French economy: farmers will be able to harvest hemp flower, laboratories will be able to extract CBD, and brands will be able to launch new ‘Made in France’ products.»

«This is an important victory, but the work continues. France is held back by dogmatic and electoral postures that are out of touch with people's needs.

Sébastien BEGUERIE is also delighted with this victory, «finally being recognized as an innovative entrepreneur and not as a delinquent». He hopes that, in the wake of this decision, «France will seize the tremendous economic opportunity represented by cannabis by breaking out of its ideological posture».

Me Xavier PIZARRO also an intervener before the French Constitutional Council on behalf of the Union des Professionnels du CBD (UPCBD), which is due to be examined in December, hopes that this hearing «will mean that France will finally start supporting cannabis entrepreneurs, rather than vainly pursuing them through the courts».