Editor's Note
USDA Hemp Program Chief William Richmond told dietary supplement manufacturers attending AHPA's sold out Hemp-CBD Supplement Congress last week that the department understands how complex it is to set a national THC testing standard, but he promised that federal authorities are scrambling to give farmers and state and local regulators a solution that simplifies interstate hemp commerce. He said USDA hoped to have hemp rules prepared by now, but the department is grappling with the  Farm Bill ‘s requirement for a national THC testing protocol “using post-decarboxylation or other similarly reliable methods.”
Federal agriculture authorities are struggling to craft a nationwide THC testing standard so that state and local regulators can tell hemp from marijuana, complicating the release of standardized production rules, according to an official with the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

William Richmond, head of the Specialty Crops Program in the USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service, told a group of dietary-supplement and CBD business owners last week the agency hoped to have hemp rules prepared by now.

But he said that the USDA is grappling with the Farm Bill‘s requirement for a national THC testing protocol “using post-decarboxylation or other similarly reliable methods.”

“We need to have testing procedures in place,” he said. Coming up with reliable testing methods, he added, is “as complicated as you think it is.”