The passing of the 2018 Farm Bill opened a whole new world of opportunities in the hemp industry. Now, anyone can venture into this high-potential niche and grow with it. But this opens a new line of trouble: risk of dealing with low-quality or illegal products. This is both dangerous to you, your customers, and could easily crumble your hemp business faster than you can imagine.
One of the studies done on CBD oils in the UK established that 38% of them had 50% less than what was indicated on their packaging. And you know what? One of the samples picked in the market had no CBD, yet it was labeled CBD oil.
This is a situation that plays out too often in the market. To get it right when trading cannabis products, the secret is getting your products tested by a third party laboratory before stocking them. In this post, we are going to take a closer look at how 3rd party lab testing CBD operates.
Understanding Third Party Lab Testing CBD?
Before looking at how 3rd party laboratory testing works, it is important to start by understanding what it is. Third party lab testing is a method of assessing the quality of a product by a laboratory that is not associated in any way with the product producer or any party in the supply chain.
Because the third party laboratories like this one are independent, it implies they do not have any interest in the success of one or several parties in the CBD supply chain. This means that you can expect unbiased laboratory results of the content of the submitted sample. This is considered the best method of determining the quality of CBD products.
How Does Third Party Lab Testing CBD Works
The laboratories are licensed organizations that work with clients who want their products to get tested for quality. Therefore, they use recommended technologies and experts who scientifically test a sample to determine the presence of harmful components and quantities of targeted products. In the case of CBD products testing, the laboratories determine the quantities of Cannabinoids.
When you submit a sample CBD product to a specific laboratory for testing, the results you get are considered representatives of the entire batch supplied by a dealer. The process of testing the sample depends on the technology that the laboratory uses. So here are some of the top technologies used for testing and presenting the results of a CBD sample.
- High-Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC). This is the commonest test that is used by most laboratories.
- Mass Spectronomy (MS) Test.
- Nuclear Magnetic Resonance (NMR) Spectroscopy Testing.
Using the above technologies, the laboratory will conduct high-profile testing to give the correct quantities of components in each product. This implies that if a supplier has indicated that his products have a specific level of cannabinoid, you will be able to know whether the information is true or false. The common products tested by third party laboratories include:
- Cannabinoids (most laboratories test up to 15 cannabonoids including Δ-9 THC, Δ-8 THC, CBD, THCA, CBC, THCV, CBN, and CBDV.
- Insecticides.
- Heavy metals.
- Organic solvents.
- Bio contaminants.
Although the hemp industry is relatively new and no doubt with huge potential, many players entering there are simply interested in profits. Therefore, you cannot be sure that the products have the content they claim to have until they are tested by third party laboratories. Pick a reliable and committed third party laboratory to test all your products so that your clients only buy clean, quality, safe and effective CBD oil or other products.