PGP Farmer, the French biotech building the country’s first EU-GMP medical cannabis production site, has narrowed a 30-variety Dutch phenotyping trial to five elite cultivars, laying the agronomic groundwork for its 9-hectare Dordogne facility as France closes on the reforms needed for full medical cannabis rollout.
The selection, announced on September 16, 2026, comes as Paris nears publication of the decrees that will trigger the opening of the Agence nationale de sécurité du médicament (ANSM) dossier window and the resumption of the Haute Autorité de Santé (HAS) reimbursement evaluation, marking the last regulatory steps before commercial supply can begin.
The proof-of-concept, conducted in the Netherlands with applied research platform Innexo B.V., took 2,400 seeds and 1,440 transplanted plants through several months of progressive screening on vigour, yield and pharmaceutical-grade quality indicators. Five cultivars, drawn from a starting library of 30 genotypes, will advance to Phase 2, which will define the standard operating procedures for the Dordogne site.
“Selecting five elite varieties from the 30 subjected to this POC required absolute rigour, based on criteria of excellence,” said Dr Frédéric Lota, Chief Scientific Officer at PGP Farmer, who is leading the trial in partnership with Innexo B.V.
“We now have the highest-performing varieties to enter phase 2 and refine the design of the future pharmaceutical site in the Dordogne, to guarantee patients irreproachable quality in strict compliance with EU-GMP standards.”
READ MORE…
Backed by a €3m round closed in February, PGP Farmer positions itself as the only French operator producing raw pharmaceutical materials (MPUP) for medical cannabis. The Dordogne site is designed to reach 30 tonnes of annual capacity when fully utilised, a scale intended to loosen France’s, and Europe’s, dependence on non-EU imports.
Around 75% of medical cannabis flower supplied inside the bloc still originates outside it, with Germany alone importing close to 200 tonnes in 2025.
The trial results land as France finalises the regulatory architecture for commercial rollout. On June 30, the government confirmed to the Senate that the decree covering reimbursement of cannabis-based medicines had been sent to the Conseil d’État; its examination began after the summer recess.
Publication of that decree, alongside the general authorisation decree and the ministerial orders setting cultivation conditions and product specifications, is expected in the coming weeks. PGP Farmer has contributed to the joint HAS dossier coordinated by industry body UIVEC, signed by around a dozen French and international operators.
“The generalisation of medical cannabis is finally arriving in France, after several years of waiting and delays,” said Brahim Sebart, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of PGP Farmer.
“What is still needed is for French companies to be able to produce on our territory. Our mission is to guarantee France a 100% French pharmaceutical raw material, at the service of patients.”
