Thailand's Cannabis and Hemp Act: Still Stalled, Still Consequential for Export Operators

Thailand's cannabis export sector operates under a patchwork of ministerial notifications, not a comprehensive law. The Cannabis and Hemp Act, the bill that would establish a unified licensing authority, a statutory penalty framework, and defined export pathways, cleared its first parliamentary reading but has not passed its second or third readings as of June 2026. The Ministry of Public Health completed a public consultation on the current draft between April 22 and May 21, 2026. Parliamentary submission and a vote remain on an uncertain timeline.

This article is distinct from the April 2026 regulation analysis published here on June 1, which covered what the specific ministerial regulations currently in force actually require of cultivators, processors, and exporters. This article addresses the bigger picture: why the comprehensive act has not passed, what operating in the resulting regulatory vacuum means strategically, and why waiting for legislative clarity before building compliance infrastructure is a mistake.

What the Cannabis and Hemp Act Would Establish

Thailand currently governs cannabis through a layered system of ministerial notifications, DTAM certifications, Thai FDA licensing for extracts, and ONCB narcotics oversight. These three agencies operate under different ministries with different inspection cycles, different documentation standards, and different enforcement authorities. There is no single licensing body that issues, monitors, and enforces a unified cannabis operator license.

The Cannabis and Hemp Act would change this by creating a statutory framework with several specific outcomes. It would establish a single licensing authority responsible for cultivation, processing, and export licenses across all cannabis product types. It would codify penalty levels in statute, replacing the current ministerial-notification-based enforcement system where penalties are more limited and revocation is the primary tool. It would define export pathway criteria in legislation rather than in notifications that can be amended without parliamentary review. And it would set ownership and investment rules in statute, providing foreign investors with more certainty than the current ministerial-notification-based exclusions offer.

The act would also supersede the April 2026 ministerial regulations that are currently the operative rules. Whether it would preserve, relax, or tighten the foreign ownership exclusions on extract production is a question the current draft has not fully resolved to the satisfaction of all stakeholders who participated in the May 2026 consultation.

Why the Act Has Not Passed

Thailand's cannabis industry carries an unusual political weight. The 2022 decriminalization was the signature policy of Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul's Bhumjaithai Party, framed as a rural development and public health initiative. The industry that actually emerged from decriminalization was not what was intended: a quasi-recreational dispensary economy that had little to do with medical export or pharmaceutical-grade production. The government has spent 2023 through 2026 attempting to reverse that outcome through ministerial notifications, controlled-herb reclassifications, and retail licensing restrictions, while simultaneously trying to preserve and develop the legitimate medical export pathway that was the original policy goal.

Drafting a comprehensive act that satisfies these competing objectives is genuinely difficult. The medical export sector needs clear, internationally credible compliance pathways. The domestic cannabis industry has thousands of license holders who have built businesses under the decriminalization framework and are resistant to provisions that would require them to exit or radically restructure. The conservative political opposition has used cannabis regulation as a proxy for broader social policy arguments. Anutin's own party needs the act to validate his original cannabis legalization legacy while demonstrating that the government corrected the recreational overreach.

The Ministry of Public Health's public consultation, which ran for 30 days through May 21, 2026, collected input from these competing constituencies. The ministry is now reviewing submissions before finalizing the draft for parliamentary submission. Parliamentary passage, once submitted, requires second and third readings, committee review, and a vote. A realistic timeline for passage, if the process moves efficiently, is late 2026 at the earliest, and 2027 is plausible if significant redrafting is required after the consultation review.

What the Regulatory Vacuum Means in Practice

Operators running cannabis businesses in Thailand right now are working under three principal operative instruments: the MoPH Notification on Controlled Herbs (Cannabis) B.E. 2568, effective June 26, 2025, which governs cannabis flower classification, retail premises licensing, and prescription requirements; the Ministerial Regulation on cannabis and hemp extract production, import, export, and possession B.E. 2569, effective April 26, 2026, which governs high-THC extract operations and excludes foreign-owned entities from production licenses; and the Controlled Herbs Amendment (No. 2) B.E. 2569, effective April 30, 2026, which overlays flower export traceability requirements on the controlled herbs framework.

Each of these is a ministerial instrument. Ministerial regulations and notifications in Thailand can be amended through cabinet-level or ministerial-level action without requiring parliamentary vote. The regulatory environment can change faster than statutory law, which in some circumstances is an advantage for nimble policy adjustment and in others is a source of uncertainty for operators building multi-year compliance and investment plans.

The absence of a single licensing authority means that a Thai cannabis export operation must maintain active compliance with DTAM, the Thai FDA, and the ONCB simultaneously. Each has its own inspection cycle, its own documentation standards, and its own remediation process when deficiencies are found. International buyers conducting supplier audits encounter this multi-agency structure and must understand it, or their audit frameworks will miss critical compliance gaps.

For foreign investors evaluating Thai cannabis businesses, the regulatory vacuum creates a specific category of uncertainty around ownership rules. The April 2026 extract regulation excludes foreign-owned entities from production licenses under the Foreign Business Act classification framework. Whether the Cannabis and Hemp Act will preserve this exclusion, create a foreign investment pathway under specific conditions, or tighten it further is genuinely unknown. Investment structures that rely on expectations about what the act will say are speculative positions, not informed compliance plans.

The December 2026 License Cliff

Extract production licenses issued under the 2020 and 2021 regulatory frameworks expire on December 31, 2026. Re-qualification under the 2026 framework is required. As covered in the June 1 article on the April regulations, the re-qualification process involves a full assessment under the new criteria, including the foreign ownership exclusion, and Thai regulatory re-qualification processes routinely take four to six months when documentation is in order.

The Cannabis and Hemp Act's passage before December 31, 2026 would change the re-qualification requirements, potentially replacing the April 2026 regulatory framework with a statutory one that has different criteria. Operators who are waiting for the act to clarify re-qualification requirements before beginning the process are taking a material risk. If the act does not pass before the license expiry date, those operators will need to re-qualify under the April 2026 regulations on an emergency timeline. If the act does pass but requires different compliance documentation than the current regulations, operators who have been building compliance infrastructure under the current rules will have work they can build on, not wasted work.

The correct approach is to treat the existing April 2026 regulations as the operative re-qualification framework and begin the process now, while tracking the legislative calendar for any act passage that would change the requirements.

What the Act Does Not Change

There is a category of requirements that the Cannabis and Hemp Act cannot change regardless of what it says, and that category matters more for export operators than anything in the bill itself. EU-GMP certification requirements are set by EU competent authorities. GACP standards are set by the EMA. TGA quality requirements are set by Australia's regulatory framework. MHRA import permits are issued under UK narcotics law. BfArM issues import permits under German pharmaceutical law.

None of these are determined by Thai domestic law. A Thai operator whose compliance position is built around international quality standards and export market requirements, rather than the minimum Thai domestic framework, is positioned to export regardless of what the Cannabis and Hemp Act says when it passes. Waiting for Thai legislative clarity before beginning EU-GACP alignment or CUMCS certification preparation is not a defensible delay. Those programs run on 6 to 24 month timelines and the export window is not pausing for Thai parliamentary process.

DeeMED's medical cannabis export consulting work covers both the Thai regulatory side (DTAM GACP certification, Thai FDA extract licensing, ONCB narcotics compliance) and the international quality alignment work that determines whether a Thai supply chain can actually be used by a European or Australian buyer. If you are building a Thai export operation and want a current assessment of what the regulatory vacuum means for your specific structure, reach out directly.