Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether her Department intends to take steps to support the uptake of industrial hemp farming, in the context of challenges around licensing and investment in the sector.

Defra recognises the valuable addition industrial hemp can provide to farmers when planning their crop rotation. The responsibility for the regulation of industrial hemp and licencing for cannabis cultivation in the UK lies with the Home Office.

After further consultation with the industry the Home Office, with support of Defra, has introduced reforms to licensing that make it easier for farmers to cultivate industrial hemp. From January 2025, the rules on ‘site sensitivity’ were removed. Also, the duration of licences granted from January 2026 has been extended from three years to six years, with no additional fees.

The Government has also announced its intention to raise the permitted tetrahyrdocannabinol (THC) levels in industrial hemp varieties to 0.3%, with plans in place to amend the relevant legislation needed to bring this into force.

Combined, these reforms will enable an expansion of the UK’s hemp growing area, with better alignment of licences with the farming calendar and crop rotation planning, more flexibility in where it can be grown and an increase in the number of varieties growers can use.