by Arun Apte, CEO, CloudLIMS.com
Even though some states in the U.S. have made cannabis legal, it's still against federal law. This means that the rules and regulations for cannabis-related businesses are different from state to state. For instance, in some states, testing facilities for cannabis must get ISO/IEC 17025 accreditation as part of their licensing process, and they need to be inspected by a qualified auditor. On the other hand, in other states, many labs are choosing to get audited voluntarily to become accredited.
An introduction to ISO/IEC 17025
ISO/IEC 17025 is a global standard that outlines the fundamental requirements for labs to operate competently, impartially, and consistently. The standard outlines the necessary activities for lab operations to establish trust in their ability to produce valid and reliable calibration, testing, and sampling results.
The current version of this standard is ISO/IEC 17025:2017, which was developed through collaboration between the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) and the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC).
Accreditation is an official declaration by an accreditation body that a lab is capable of fulfilling the requirements of ISO 17025 to conduct tests in accordance with its accredited scope.
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