Marijuana Edibles and Infused Beverages Should Go On Sale in Canada by October

The wait for alternative cannabis options lingers on in Canada

However, Canada’s legalization wasn’t as broad-based as you might think. Although dried cannabis flower, sublingual sprays, and cannabis oils were legalized, other popular forms of consumption were not. This included edibles, cannabis-infused beverages, extracts/concentrates, topicals, and vapes. This was likely done to expedite the approval of the Cannabis Act through Parliament, as well as allow the industry to get its bearings.

One of the bigger questions has been when the Canadian government would address alternative consumption options. Since dried cannabis flower has been commoditized in a handful of recreationally legal U.S. states, the expectation is that Canada will follow suit in the years to come. This puts alternative marijuana products into the spotlight, since they’re expected to have higher price points, higher margins, and be far less susceptible to pricing pressure, than dried flower.

New consumption options are coming, but there are caveats

Recently, Health Canada helped put some of those questions to rest by laying out its plan of action on alternative consumption options. According to a rough outline provided by the Canadian regulatory agency, and detailed by the National Post, edibles, infused beverages, topicals, and extracts should be legal by this fall, no later than Oct. 17, 2019. That’s exactly one year after adult-use pot became legal for sale in Canada. Of course, there are plenty of caveats to this product expansion.

For example, the draft provided by Health Canada calls for strict caps on the amount of tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) that these products can contain. THC is the psychoactive cannabinoid responsible for getting a user high. The agency suggests that no package of edibles would be permitted more than 10 milligrams of THC, with topicals and extracts limited to 1,000 milligrams of THC.

(read the full article at The Motley Fool)