Taking into account the comments of the Ministry of Justice and the Law Department of the Seimas, the improved amendments to the Fiber Hemp Law providing for this were registered by the Minister of Agriculture, Member of the Seimas Kęstutis Navickas.
“The draft proposes to remove the requirement as redundant, causing unnecessary trade barriers. (…) In order to ensure the safety of consumers, it is important how much THC is present in the final product intended for consumption, and not in the raw material from which it is made. The amount of THC in the final product depends not only on the raw material, but also on the production technology of the product,” the explanatory note of the document says.
It is expected that in this way the conditions will be created for the import of fiber hemp products and their products from other EU member states into Lithuania.
“Lithuanian economic entities intending to import fibrous hemp products to Lithuania do not have the opportunity to obtain a certificate from state institutions or business partners of EU countries that the products or their products are made from fibrous hemp, in which the THC content does not exceed the permitted limit of 0.3 percent, if those countries legal acts do not specify the requirements for issuing such a certificate”, say the authors of the project.
Amendments to the law also propose to allow the import of a limited quantity from third countries – no more than 6 kg of seeds of non-legalized EU fibrous hemp varieties without an import license for scientific experimental or breeding purposes.
“We set the conditions for the import of fiber hemp seeds intended for sowing in order to allow scientific and study institutions to conduct scientific research or experiments with fiber hemp varieties that are not legalized in the EU, or to conduct economic value studies with third countries, e.g. with fibrous hemp varieties bred in Ukraine in order to enter the fibrous hemp variety in the National List of Plant Varieties and thereby legalize it in the EU,” the explanatory note of the document says.
It is proposed that the amendments to the law enter into force on July 1 of this year.
A. Širinskienė: it would be allowed to extract narcotic substances from fibrous hemp
At that time, the deputy chairman of the Law and Order Committee of the Seimas, Agnė Širinskienė, sees the danger that 0.3 percent Eliminating the THC content limit will essentially allow the extraction of narcotic substances from hemp fiber.
“0.3 percent the limit for active substances in fiber hemp was established because it is grown for fiber, not narcotic substances. Now they are trying to remove that limit and allow any amount of active narcotic substance to be concentrated. Essentially, this means that the extraction of narcotic substances from hemp fiber would be permitted, but all process controls would apply as for non-narcotic fiber. The authors of the project want to leave all the control and supervision as if it were not narcotic substances, but basically they allow the extraction of narcotic substances”, A. Širinskienė commented on the amendments to the Eltai Law.
In her opinion, these materials can enter the illegal market.
“Fiber hemp is grown for fiber. Therefore, I do not understand why there is a need to destroy the limit and allow unlimited extraction of active substances? I would imagine that a fairly high concentration of narcotics will be concentrated, and the surveillance system is not developed. It is obvious that then it will enter the illegal market and trade will take place”, predicted A. Širinskienė, who works in the Mixed Group of Seimas Members.
Together with K. Navickas, Seimas members Kęstutis Masiulis, Jurgis Razma, Morgana Danielė, Tomas Vytautas Raskevičius, Linas Slušnys, Kazys Starkevičius, Ričardas Juška, Monika Ošmianskienė and others submit the amendments to the fiber hemp law.
This is already an improved project, because its previous version was criticized by the Seimas Law Department due to its possible contradiction with the Constitution.
