Following the 2018 legalization of recreational cannabis usage in Canada, the quality and safety of cannabis products has garnered significant attention. Health Canada has developed a regulatory program mandating pesticide testing on all cannabis products. Under the program, licensed producers (LPs) of cannabis products in Canada are required to send representative samples of products to independent laboratories for pesticide screening and quantification.

In this application note, a robust and reliable method for the analysis of 96 pesticides in cannabis flower by LC/MS/MS utilizing both ESI and APCI modes is presented. The method not only offers ultra-low detection limits at or below the Health Canada regulatory levels, but also offers significant efficiency gains over other available methodologies. Utilizing LC/MS/MS with both ESI and APCI modes obviates the need to perform both GC/MS/MS and LC/MS/MS analyses to analyze all 96 regulated pesticides, saving significant time and money for operators.