permaculture

[Lawrence London <lfljvenaura@gmail.com>]

[How does hemp seed rate as a source of quality protein? - LL]

25 November 2012 Last updated at 19:09 ET
Hemp: Could the US rekindle its love affair? By Jon Kelly BBC News
Magazine, Washington DC
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20463504

Hemp, once a major US crop, has been banned for years because of its close
association with cannabis. But several states now want to resume hemp
farming, and two states voted this month in favour of legalisation of
cannabis. Could change be in the air?

There's an all-American plant that weaves its way throughout the nation's
history.

The sails of Columbus' ships were made from it. So was the first US flag.
It was used in the paper on which the Declaration of Independence was
printed.

Today, however, industrial hemp is effectively banned by the federal
government, damned by association with cannabis, its intoxicating cousin.

While hemp cannot be grown in the US, it can be imported and used to
manufacture paper, textiles, rope, fuel, food and plastics.

Its advocates say it is a hugely versatile crop which is already popular
with US consumers - a 2012 report by the Congressional Research
Service<http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RL32725.pdf>estimated that the
annual US retail hemp market could exceed $300m (£188m)
in value.
 Continue reading the main
story<http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20463504#story_continues_2>
Made
from hemp

Hemp can be used in a wide variety of products, including:

   - Food (flour, oil, roasted seeds, salad dressing, wine, beer, cheese,
   biscuits)
   - Paper (books, envelopes, newspapers, magazines)
   - Furnishings (blankets, carpets, napkins, rugs)
   - Cosmetics (hair conditioner, lip balm, shampoos, soaps)
   - Textiles (clothes, bags etc)


   - Source: Hemp Industries Association<http://www.thehia.org/products.html>

 Hemp's problem is that, like marijuana, it contains tetrahydracannabinol
(THC), a psychoactive chemical, albeit in much smaller doses than its
better-known relative.

While the US federal Drugs Enforcement Agency (DEA) adopts a zero-tolerance
policy towards THC, hemp advocates say one would have to smoke a telegraph
pole-sized joint of hemp to get high from it.

But advocates of its legal cultivation believe the winds of change are
blowing.

States such as Oregon, North Dakota, Vermont, Montana and West Virginia
have backed its legal cultivation.

In Congress, an unlikely coalition of lawmakers ranging from right-wing
Republicans to liberal Democrats are pushing for reform.

And votes in Colorado and Washington state to legalise, regulate and tax
marijuana could, supporters believe, open the door of the drug's less
potent relative.

After all, within living memory, fields of hemp abounded in Kentucky and
the Midwest.
  Hemp crop in Fayette County, central Kentucky, 1942

"If you go back to the 1940s, the US was a very large hemp producer," says
Isaac Campos, an expert on the drug trade at the University of Cincinnati.
"It was more profitable than corn and soya beans."

As far back as 1607, the crop was produced in Virginia. From 1619, all
planters in the colony were required by law to grow it.
 Continue reading the main
story<http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20463504#story_continues_3>
Marijuana
in the polls

In ballots held on 6 November, residents of Colorado and Washington voted
to legalise the possession and sale of marijuana for recreational use.

Measures to approve the medicinal use of marijuana were on the ballot in
three states, including Massachusetts, which passed the proposal.

However, cannabis remains an illegal drug under federal law. This clash
could set the DEA and the states against each other in the courts.

   - Read more: Marijuana legalisation in the
US<http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20346431>

 Founding fathers George Washington and Thomas Jefferson both cultivated
hemp on their land. The cord around the US Constitution was reputedly made
from hemp.

It was seen as an important crop relatively recently, too.

During World War II, it was so crucial to the military that farmers who
grew it and their sons were exempted from military service. It was
celebrated in a 1942 public information film, Hemp For
Victory<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ne9UF-pFhJY>,
which has since gone on to achieve cult popularity among latter-day
generations of stoners.

In 1941, that most iconic of American industrialists, Henry Ford, produced
a car whose plastic frame was partially made of hemp and whose engine could
be powered by hemp fuel.
  Henry Ford, right, with a car made of farm products such as soy, hemp and
flax

"A lot of this was written out of history," says Eric Steenstra, president
of the Hemp Industries Association. "But this was a historically
significant crop."
 Continue reading the main
story<http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-20463504#story_continues_4>
'Why
I want to grow hemp'

*Wayne Hauge, 54, farms 2,400 acres** (971 hectares)** of arable land in
North Dakota and campaigns for the legalisation of industrial hemp.*

"I've been a farmer for over 30 years. Both of my great-grandfathers were
farmers.

"I don't exactly fit the stereotype of a pot-smoking dude. I don't want
anything to do with smoking cannabis. I've never touched the stuff.

"I just think industrial hemp would be profitable to grow. It's an easy
crop to cultivate - it's practically a weed.

"With all crops, you need rotation. Industrial hemp merely provides another
option.

"I'm 50 miles from Canada. There are people not far north of here growing
hemp. It seems logical to conclude it would work down here too.

"At state level industrial hemp is widely supported. But when politicians
get to federal level it seems their priorities change."

Around the turn of the 20th Century, hemp faced two obstacles, however.

One was the decline of the shipping industry, which meant demand for hemp
ropes and sails fell.

The other was guilt by association with a substance which became the focus
of an American moral anxiety.

"In Mexico by the 1890s, marijuana was believed to cause madness and
violence," says Campos. "By the 1910s that idea was quite established in
the US.

"There was just so much enthusiasm among the prohibitors to ban cannabis
and hemp was caught up in that."

The Marihuana (sic) Tax Act of 1937 effectively banned all varieties of the
plant cannabis sativa, although farmers were temporarily exempted from this
while they were encouraged to grow hemp during wartime. The Controlled
Substances Act of 1970 explicitly outlawed cannabinoids.

Advocates for the crop never entirely went away, however. Because hemp
requires much less irrigation, and around half as much land as cotton to
produce the same amount of textile, supporters of legalisation say it is
much more environmentally friendly. Hemp seed and its oil, too, are
championed by health food enthusiasts.

Canada's decision in 1998 to legalise the growth of hemp under licence
appears to have spurred on legislators south of the border.

Since 2005, the libertarian Texas Republican Ron Paul has introduced four
bills to the House of Representatives aimed at making hemp farming lawful.
The most recent of these, the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2011,
attracted 22 co-sponsors.

In August 2012, Mr Paul's son, Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, co-sponsored a
bill with Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden in the upper chamber which would exempt
Hemp from the Controlled Substances Act.

Some 17 states have passed hemp-related legislation and 10 (Colorado,
Hawaii, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Montana, North Dakota, Oregon, Vermont
and West Virginia) have approved bills to remove barriers to its production.
  Industrial hemp is grown in Europe, but China is the biggest producer

The obstacle remains the federal authorities. Hemp cannot be grown without
a DEA permit and the agency remains opposed to its cultivation.

"'Hemp' is simply a term used by some to create the false impression that
so-called 'hemp' is not the same as marijuana," a DEA spokesman says. "In
fact, under federal law, all cannabis plants (that is, all plants of the
genus cannabis) are marijuana."

Opponents of legalisation say it would be extremely difficult for the
authorities to tell whether illicit varieties of cannabis sativa were being
surreptitiously grown amid fields of the industrial hemp crop.

However, according to Randy Fortenbery of Washington State University, who
has studied the economic viability of hemp production, the voter
initiatives in Washington and Colorado may make this a moot point.

"A lot of the resistance was about not being able to tell the difference
between commercial hemp and crops grown for marijuana," he says.

"But if marijuana becomes more acceptable then this isn't an issue any
more."