Hempseed Meal Gets Nod for Inclusion in Layer Feed
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During its annual meeting in San Antonia last week, the Association of American Feed Control Officials announced its approval to use hempseed meal in chicken feed for commercial layers. Hempseed meal is made by milling or grinding leftover cake after oil is extracted from Cannabis sativa L. seeds via mechanical processing.
This decision will allow this hemp ingredient to be used as a source of fat and protein in diets for layers in America, with the agency capping the ingredient’s rate of inclusion at 20%.
The agency is now planning to include hempseed meal, albeit tentatively, in its official publication. This temporary status will allow individual states to proceed with commercial adoption. It should be noted, however, that feed regulators aren’t required to accept it. It is expected that most states will adopt these provisional approvals, as per the Hemp Feed Coalition, which will in turn promote the use of hempseed meal as an ingredient in animal feed.
Once the annual review is completed, the Association of American Feed Control Officials will have the chance to make it official.
This approval news comes after recommendations were made by the Center for Veterinary Medicine under the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Hemp Feed Coalition to approve hempseed meal for laying hens earlier this year. According to the agreement, the approved meal cannot have more than 20-parts-per-million (ppm) of CBD and 2 ppm of THC.
CBD and THC are the two primary compounds found in the cannabis plant. While THC induces a high when ingested, CBD does not.
These proposed limits aren’t agreeable to some players in the space, including the Canadian Hemp Trade Alliance, which pointed out that the limit would be too low for varieties of hemp cultivated in North America. The European Industrial Hemp Association also called attention to the fact that the proposed thresholds didn’t align with research on cannabinoid risk in feed.
In response, the Hemp Feed Coalition explained that the regulatory environment in the United States differed from others globally since the strict standards imposed by the FDA on cannabinoid content made alignment difficult. It also noted that this wouldn’t affect other countries, as global harmonization of hemp rules would be ideal.
Andrew Bish, coalition president, emphasized that the group was committed to ensuring the effectiveness and safety of hempseed meal in America’s regulatory framework. He then added that continued dialogue at the global level was crucial for future alignment.
The OK to add hempseed meal to layer feeds creates downstream uses for the material left after companies such as Software Effective Solutions Corp. (d/b/a MedCana) (OTC: SFWJ) have extracted CBD and other ingredients from hemp biomass.
NOTE TO INVESTORS: The latest news and updates relating to Software Effective Solutions Corp. (d/b/a MedCana) (OTC: SFWJ) are available in the company’s newsroom at https://cnw.fm/SFWJ
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