The future of the UK’s CBD industry

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) announced in February that CBD oil products will have to be registered by March 2021, otherwise they will face being pulled off the shelves. With CBD oil use increasing by over 100% in the UK between 2017 and 2019, and representing a market that will be valued at over £1bn by 2025, there are fears that consumers are left vulnerable to insufficient testing practices in the industry, and potential exposure to the illegal compound, THC.

The UK’s leading CBD oil testing and toxicology service, Eos Scientific, have therefore launched a heavily discounted Novel Foods Submissions Service in a bid to help smaller CBD brands submitting their applications to the FSA in time. Compared to the average cost of launching a Stock Keeping Unit (SKU) to market – typically £500,000 – Eos Scientific’s service will be heavily discounted, costing between £40,000 – £100,000.

The service provides for a full end-to-end regulatory service including toxicology studies where required. Every aspect of the product including the manufacturing process, the raw material processing and toxicology, the stability, the cannabinoid content, and overall safety is detailed and built into a comprehensive dossier by Eos Scientific, that is then submitted to the regulator for approval.

Simon Manthorpe, CEO of Eos Scientific, has commented in the impact that the FSA regulations will have on the CBD market and the reasoning for launching the submission service.

“We are going to see a massive shrinking in the number of brands selling edible or orally administered products in the UK and EU. The cost of a Novel Foods Submission will be cost prohibitive for many companies and we expect less than 100 brands to have made valid submissions by the deadline of March 31st 2021.

In 2019 the Centre for Medicinal Cannabis estimated the UK market to be worth £300m and expected it to grow to £1bn by 2025. The product split across vapeable, topical and edible/oral shows that edible/oral products account for more than 50% of the market. Furthermore we expect more than 50% of the brands in the market currently selling edible/oral products will drop out completely or switch to vapeable and/or topical products only.

This will leave some huge gaps in terms of product choice for retailers and ultimately consumers, but from the industry perspective whoever survives this process will have access to far more of the market than was previously available. The value in the sub-category wont drop, if anything it will in