Pesticide-driven recall a challenge for medicinal pot

After an unauthorized pesticide was discovered in medical marijuana products, triggering recalls, a licensed grower that runs a massive greenhouse north of Calgary says the fledgling industry “must ensure that it never happens again.”

Still, a top executive at Aurora Cannabis Inc. said Monday the recalls are proof that industry oversight and company testing are effective at identifying risks in medical pot sold to customers.

“It’s unfortunate that some people were affected by this recall,” said Cam Battley, executive vice-president at the Vancouver company. “But it’s the exception to the rule... This is a system that is working day in, day out, and it’s handling 10 per cent, per-month growth.”

The recalls come as the legal marijuana production industry seeks to legitimize itself ahead of Ottawa authorizing recreational pot use.

Dundee Capital Partners, an investment dealer, is holding a medical pot conference Tuesday in Calgary, featuring many of the key players in the emerging industry.

Aurora sells marijuana grown at its 55,000 square foot production facility in Cremona, along with different varieties it imports from other licensed growers.

The company’s testing revealed products it bought from New Brunswick-based OrganiGram Inc. had contained pesticides not federally approved for marijuana production.

Aurora sent the red-flagged products back to OrganiGram, which contacted Health Canada and issued a recall. The affected pot contained either bifenazate or myclobutanil, a fungicide widely reported to produce hydrogen cyanide when burned, or both.

Myclobutanil is banned from medical marijuana production in Colorado.

When announcing a recall of “unsafe pesticide residues,” including myclobutanil, Denver’s Department of Environmental Health said a year ago the health effects of consuming pot products with the pesticide are unknown.

OrganiGram first issued a recall late December after tests found low levels of bifenazate or myclobutanil, both of which are approved for use in food production. The company issued a wider recall Jan. 9 after further testing found concentrations that exceeded levels permitted in food agriculture.

This broader recall affected products that Aurora had sold to its customers. It issued its own recall on Jan. 13, vowing to reimburse clients for any money they spent on the contaminated pot.

Battley said he couldn’t immediately confirm how many Aurora customers were affected, but he said recalled pot accounted for three or four per cent of the company’s total production last year.

OrganiGram invoked what Health Canada calls a Type II recall, which means exposure to the recalled pot products may cause temporary health problems, or that there are low risks of serious adverse effects.

Health Canada said it was not aware of any reports of adverse effects linked to the chemical.

Ray Gracewood, chief commercial officer at OrganiGram, said company officials have no idea how myclobutanil ended up in their products. He said the firm is an organic grower of medical marijuana that doesn’t use pesticides.

“We’re going to great lengths to figure out the root cause,” Gracewood said.

OrganiGram, which is facing angry customers publicly musing about legal action on social media, is testing all production materials, interviewing employees and asking suppliers for full disclosure of ingredient lists, Gracewood said.

“We hadn’t tested for these pesticides in the past because they are not used within our process and there would be no reason for us to do so,” Gracewood said.

The recall, however, has triggered a series of safeguards, such as tests for all supplied materials and the company’s own harvests.

“Working with our quality assurance group, we are confident that we have put things in place to ensure that there is no chance that this could ever happen again,” Gracewood said.

The recall is not the only one hitting the medical pot industry.

Mettrum Health Corp., a licensed pot producer based in Toronto, has recently recalled products that have been found to contain pyrethrin, an insecticide not authorized by Health Canada for use on medical cannabis.

The company said the insecticide, widely used in agriculture, was detected in plant spray the company was using, though the manufacturer didn’t disclose it in a list of ingredients.

According to Health Canada, these affected pot products will not likely cause health problems.

Battley said he would raise concerns surrounding the recalls with colleagues in the industry and those on the board of Cannabis Canada, the association that represents regulated producers.

“We are going to collectively make sure that this does not happen again.”

We hadn’t tested for these pesticides in the past because they are not used within our process…