Thailand’s Government Pharmaceutical Organization (GPO) plans to produce 10,000 bottles of medical cannabis oil in three formulae in December.

GPO director Dr. Vithoon Danviboon said Wednesday that the oil will be extracted from 140 medical-grade cannabis plants of the CBD strain grown indoors at the organization’s facility this month, with the anticipation that the plants will be ready to be processed into three types of oil formulae, namely THC, CBD and THC-CBD.

He said that the GPO had recently gathered and summarized the opinions of participants in a workshop, entitled “Mapping the Thai Approach”, on issues related to medicinal cannabis, such as quality control of the raw materials for production, distribution of the products to the patients, delivery and online applications. A summary report will be submitted to the Ministry of Public Health for consideration, he added.

The report will also cover the issue of dissemination of information to members of the public, side effects experienced by patients who use the medical cannabis and a safety follow-up program.

The report also touches on the commercial scale of the cultivation and production of cannabis products for medical use to make sure that those produced in Thailand meet the required standards.

Dr. Vithoon said that the second phase of the medical cannabis project will focus on development of cannabis strains, with medical-grade cannabis plants to be grown indoors on a larger area measuring 1,000 square metres, starting in October next year.

On the issue of the development of cannabis strains, the Maejoe University will start planting cannabis next month and supply dry cannabis plants to the GPO for extraction of medicinal cannabis oil.