Several major alcohol industry participants are backing a new bill in Congress that would exempt hemp beverages from a currently scheduled ban on THC products derived from the plant while enacting new provisions to tax and regulate the cannabis drinks like alcohol.
“Appropriately dosed hemp-derived beverages belong in a regulated adult beverage marketplace, not in a legal gray area,” Dawson Hobbs, executive vice president of government affairs for Wine & Spirits Wholesalers of America (WSWA), said in a press release supporting the new Beverage Regulatory Parity Act, introduced on Monday by Reps. Beth Van Duyne (R-TX) and Greg Landsman (D-OH).
“We thank Congresswoman Van Duyne and Congressman Landsman for their leadership advancing a framework that treats these products differently from other hemp products and builds on the alcohol regulatory system’s long record of consumer protection,” he said.
“The conversation has evolved beyond whether hemp-derived beverages should be regulated to how they should be regulated,” Dobbs said. “This legislation moves that conversation forward by following the long record of success in regulating alcohol through a federal and state partnership.”
Hemp derivatives with less than 0.3 percent delta-9 THC on a dry-weight basis were federally legalized under the 2018 Farm Bill that
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