Commercially relevant natural products and strategies to ensure quality

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Loyalist College will use ARTP funding to advance our work with small and medium-sized enterprises in the natural products and cannabis sectors. We will work with industry to overcome specific challenges such as a lack of research and standards to support product development, particularly for regulated and controlled substances, and chemistry challenges when working with natural products and/or cannabis, and unknown shelf-life and stability of products. Legal, political and complex societal factors have contributed to the limited fundamental and applied research required to better understand the complexity of plants in these sectors, and the practical challenges of developing products for the commercial market. Further, limited data is available on the compatibility of ingredients when designing new products, coupled with the uncertainty of the effects of processing, packaging, and storage on the active ingredients over time. This is a critical information gap that needs to be addressed for Canadians to be innovators in developing high-quality products, and for consumers to understand product implications. Our plan is to tackle this gap through focused industry-specific applied research projects. We will explore ingredient compatibility, test method specifications and controls, shelf life, and stability of products and packaging for the natural products and cannabis sectors. To do this we will create a research program intended to help meet the research and development (R&D) needs of companies that, in addition to other challenges, may lack financial resources or access to traditional funding or funding programs. Project results will be used to advance knowledge for these emerging sectors, support product development and commercialization, stimulate the economy and inform product guidelines and regulations. We will explore methods and controls that help produce higher quality, safer, and more consistent products and packaging for the natural products and cannabis sectors, to benefit Canadian consumers. Additionally, with viable and validated products and processes, companies will be in a better position to raise capital, attract investors, and pursue R&D funding for later stage development.