Barbados Medical Cannabis Licensing Authority partnering with country’s National Standards Institution

The Barbados Medicinal Cannabis Licensing Authority (BMCLA) is partnering with the Barbados National Standards Institution (BNSI) to support the local cannabis industry.

The partnership seeks to ensure that the medicinal cannabis industry is held to the highest ethical standards. To this end the BMCLA has received new industry standards from the BNSI.

The strategic partnership between BNSI’s standards, test methods, certification, technical regulation support and training and the BMCLA’s regulatory oversight of the cannabis industry allows both entities to establish optimal qualities for medicinal cannabis products.

Deliverables under the partnership

It has been reported by Barbados Today that the first deliverable was the testing parameters for raw cannabis material, which was developed by the BNSI in collaboration with the BMCLA and technical experts.

Raw cannabis material is the primary and fundamental ingredient in the production of medicinal cannabis products. The other deliverable from BNSI to the BMCLA was a standard for packaging and labelling of medicinal cannabis products.

The packaging and labelling standard developed under the authority of the BNSI for the BMCLA is a business tool which provides clear information to applicants and licensees on how to meet the requirements of applicable regulation in conformance with the law.

Partnership endorsed

In the official handover, BMCLA’s Chief Executive Officer Dr Shantal Munro-Knight explained that the organisation has worked with BNSI to develop testing parameters as well as standards for packaging and labelling.

These standards, she added represent an important plank in efforts to ensure high quality standards in the industry, building out a culture that fosters consumer trust and confidence that products, produced locally and abroad are safe and efficacious.

She made the point that, “as regulators of an industry that impacts persons’ health and wellbeing in the form as medicine, it is imperative that our growers and processors can confirm the contents of their products, so that information can be passed on to protect consumers”.

For his part, BNSI Chief Technical Officer Fabian Scott remarked that “the contributions of both the BNSI and the BMCLA present the industry with coherent business acumen, scientific and technical expertise. In this regard, the strategic partnership between the BNSI and the BMCLA provides both steering and supporting mechanisms in the forms of quality benchmarks, hand-holding and training to name a few”.

Said Scott: “Quality infrastructure support also helps shorten the life-cycle from plant-to-product as quality is built into each step along the production value-chain.”

He noted that “the strategic partnership, between the BNSI and the BMCLA, demonstrates the leadership and maturity of the BMCLA having embraced a Quality Culture”.