The final nail in the coffin of Italy’s booming ‘cannabis light’ sector, appears to have been hammered into place by the government.
Italy’s hemp industry has been battling for its survival for months, but a recent move by the government to accelerate the process and largely bypass parliamentary intervention, has seen this devasting bill come into force.
Recent figures suggest that this is set to decimate an industry worth nearly €2bn to the Italian economy, supporting over 22,000 workers.
While there remains an opportunity for recourse, both internally and from the European Union, the ban is now in force across the country, seeing thousands of business owners transition from entrepreneurs to drug deals overnight in the eyes of the law.
“With this rule, the Government is not only regulating a sector: it is destroying an economic reality, annihilating investments that have built a future and causing a potential bankruptcy of over 3,000 companies, with the consequent loss of 30,000 jobs,” Italian hemp association Canapa Sativa Italia said.
What happened?
On July 31, 2024, the joint Constitutional Affairs and Justice committees of the Chamber voted to add an amendment to the Security Bill that would make flowering cannabis of all types, regardless of THC content, illegal and considered a narcotic.
This amendment, known as Article 18, equates industrial hemp (inflorescences) flower with high-THC cannabis rendering the trading, processing, and exporting of leaves, ‘flower’, resins and all products containing substances derived from hemp flower illegal.
Italy’s Security Bill, which covers a raft of other controversial measures alongside the ban on industrial hemp flower and associated products, had been stuck in regulatory limbo for some months and had received pushback even from inside Georgia Meloni’s ruling coalition, his support for the petition and cause points to increasing splits within the government over the issue.
However, late last week the government moved to expedite the bill and present it as a ‘decree law’. The Italian Constitution allows the government to issue decree-laws (decreti-legge) in cases of necessity and urgency.
In effect, this ‘emergency’ measure bypasses the normal process of legislative debate in parliament, meaning the Security Bill did not return for a third reading, and lawmakers were unable to reject it or make final amendments before it is enforced.
As such, the bill is set to be enforced immediately, but this is currently only temporary. The Italian Parliament has 60 days to formally covert the decree into law before it expires.
According to legal experts, parliament can still either call for amendments or reject the bill before these 60 days are up, though given the government has a majority in both houses, this is thought to be a slim possibility.
The European Industrial Hemp Association’s (EIHA) Managing Director, Lorenza Romanese, told Business of Cannabis: “It is a great pity that Italy has adopted this text, which has nothing to do with an agricultural crop like hemp. The focus is on ‘security’—drink driving, prisons, immigration, and so on—rather than the actual nature of the plant.
“It’s unfortunate that Italy has decided to ban hemp flowers and the entire hemp plant, despite clear guidance from the Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs (1961), which explicitly excludes hemp flowers and industrial cannabis varieties from narcotic controls. Hemp flowers containing minimal THC—below 1% in Europe (not just the EU, as this includes countries like Switzerland)—pose no meaningful risk of abuse and are internationally recognised as exempt from narcotic regulations.
“By banning them, Italy disregards the intent of the Convention and unnecessarily stifles a beneficial industry with legitimate industrial, cosmetic, and nutritional applications.”
Reaction and pushback
The Italian hemp industry has, unsurprisingly, issued a vocal and unified dismissal of the government’s latest move.
Legal challenges, a push for international interjection, and even public demonstrations are all already planned in response.
Lawyers Giacomo Bulleri and Carlo Alberto Zaina, who represent Federcanapa, analysed the legality of the government’s bill, concluding that: “Article 18 of Draft Law 1236 was designed with the explicit and sole purpose of blocking the production and commercialisation of hemp inflorescences (and derivatives), regardless of the actual THC content.”
They explain that it is likely illegal both in the eyes of Italian constitutional and international law. The pair argue that the law is too vague (indeterminate) about what exactly is illegal, which undermines the constitutional principle of legal certainty under Article 25(2) of the Italian Constitution.
Furthermore, ignoring THC levels and the presence of non-psychoactive cannabinoids like CBD, CBG and CBN, which are legally tradable across the EU, represents a ‘structural flaw in the decree’, breaching numerous principles of international law.
As such, they believe legal challenges are inevitable, both in Italian and European courts.
“This decree instantly criminalises an entire agro-industrial sector with no logic, no science, and no transitional period… This can only constitute a further violation of constitutional principles and the European Convention on Human Rights, cases for which Italy has already been sanctioned in the past.”
In a statement issued over the weekend, the Imprenditori Canapa Italia (ICI) another Italian industrial hemp trade association, said: “We are faced with an act of unprecedented gravity, which marks a black page for the rule of law, freedom of enterprise and constitutional guarantees.
“With a stroke of the pen, the government has decided to transform thousands of honest entrepreneurs into criminals, guilty only of having exercised a legal profession, paid taxes regularly and created jobs.
“This rule has nothing to do with national security. It is an ideological, punitive and irresponsible choice, which exposes Italy to ridicule on the international level, undermines the principle of fair competition, violates European law and paves the way for million-dollar lawsuits and a probable infringement procedure.”
