Source: courant.com
Nevin Christensen of Flamig Farm in West Simsbury advocates for the growth of hemp in Connecticut. Hemp advocates like Christensen say that legalizing the growth of this versatile plant in Connectictut could be profitable for the state as well. (Brad Horrigan, HC)
In Simsbury, there's a farmer who would like to "throw some hemp seed in the ground and see how it grows."
A Bolton entrepreneur thinks hemp pellets could be used in stoves, and a University of Connecticut scientist is convinced that hemp seed and oil used for nutritional additives could become a high-profit crop.
Unfortunately for them, it's illegal to grow hemp — a close but non-intoxicating relative of marijuana — in Connecticut unless you obtain special permission from federal drug authorities.
That may be about to change. Three state agencies are now studying the prospects for growing hemp in Connecticut. They plan to offer recommendations for licensing and regulating hemp growers to the legislature in January.
"I think it's got to become part of our agricultural economy again," said Nevin Christensen, the Simsbury farmer who would like to experiment with growing hemp on his family's 45 acres. "It has so many uses. … We never should have banned it."
"It is a concept in these economic times that we ought to be looking at," said state Rep. Melissa Ziobron, R-East Haddam, who has proposed that Connecticut consider allowing cultivation of industrial hemp.
By some estimates, there are more than 25,000 different uses for industrial hemp. The list includes shoes, canvas, automotive products, clothing, furniture, paper, construction materials, lightweight insulation and food products, according to a study published in June by the Congressional Research Service.
The state studies, by the departments of Agriculture, Consumer Protection and Economic Development, is the result of a bill Ziobron authored that was approved in the last legislative session. Connecticut is now one of 19 states researching hemp production or considering pilot hemp projects.
The move toward industrial hemp production was accelerated by President Barack Obama's signing of a revised farm bill in February. The new federal law authorized universities and state agricultural departments to conduct pilot hemp-growing programs in states that legalize industrial hemp.
Different Kind Of Hemp
The sort of hemp used for industrial purposes is a variety of Cannabis sativa that is a close relative of the type of cannabis now being grown legally for medical purposes in Connecticut and used illegally as a recreational drug.
The big difference is that plants used for industrial hemp contain only about 0.03 percent THC, the psychoactive ingredient found in marijuana. That minute amount of THC can't get you high. Marijuana can have THC levels between 2 percent and 22 percent.
Mohegans Review Pot As Economic Opportunity
Simsbury would be an appropriate place to start growing hemp again in Connecticut. The town once had its own hemp mill to process the plant for use in Ensign-Bickford Co.'s famous safety fuses for explosives, according to Simsbury's Historic Resources Survey.
Hemp was legally grown in Connecticut for more than two centuries. Various historical records show that hemp was so valuable for the production of items like rope, sails and clothing that it was illegal for colonial-era Connecticut farmers not to grow it. During World War II, the federal government put out an informational film urging farmers to grow hemp for the war effort.
U.S. hemp production plummeted after the war, in part because the agricultural product got caught up in the anti-drug crusades of the 1950s. Before the decade was over, growing industrial hemp was banned by federal law. And although it's illegal to grow the plant in the U.S., it's legal to import it.
A Congressional Research Service report included an estimate by the Hemp Industries Association that the retail value of hemp products sold in the U.S. reached $581 million in 2013. Food, nutritional supplements and body-care products accounted for $184 million in sales, and the U.S. market for hemp-related clothing and textiles has been estimated at $100 million a year.
State Department of Agriculture officials are confident their part of the report to lawmakers will indicate that hemp can be successfully cultivated in Connecticut.
"It can grow here," said George Krivda, a spokesman for the agriculture department, "but the real question is, can anybody make money growing it?"
That's what analysts at the state Department of Economic and Community Development are trying to determine. A department spokesmen said last month that the agency isn't ready to make any comment on its findings. Nor are officials at the Department of Consumer Protection ready to discuss what they will recommend in terms of possible regulatory controls over hemp crops.
A congressional study released this summer noted that available industry statistics indicate "sales of some hemp-based products, such as foods and body care products, are growing." The report cited various studies by state agencies and Canadian researchers that offered positive forecasts for hemp production. But there was also a warning that international competition from major hemp-growing countries like China and Romania could pose problems for U.S. farmers wanting to grow hemp.
Searching For Profits
There are people in Connecticut who believe you could make a profit from hemp.
David Sudarsky has been selling hemp products, and vegan and vegetarian items, on the Internet for the past five years from his Glastonbury-based thevegetariansite.com. "It's a very good, very durable material," he said.
Sudarsky gets most of his hemp-based food and nutritional products from Canadian companies, and hemp footwear from Europe, but would love to be able to sell items made from Connecticut-grown hemp.
"Local is great," Sudarsky said. "Even to be able to say it's hemp grown in the U.S. would be nice."
Will Avery thinks he's got a grand idea for turning a profit on locally grown hemp: using it to create fuel pellets for heating stoves.
Avery, 45, lives in Bolton and operated a store in Manchester for seven years that specialized in selling hemp-based products ranging from bath and body items to backpacks and briefcases.
"I sold all sorts of stuff," he said, explaining that he got out of the business only after the store burned down in a 2003 fire.
"I have a pellet stove now," said Avery, explaining that the fuel he uses in his home heating stove comes from recycled wood products, such as sawdust. Avery said the demand for pellet fuel is now so high that the industry "is actually cutting down trees to make stove fuel pellets."
He thinks a far better idea would be to use a renewable resource like hemp.
"The inner core of the hemp stalk produces a better quality pellet … with a higher BTU factor," Avery said.
It was Avery who first approached Christensen about planting an experimental hemp plot on his Simsbury farm.
Richard Parnas, a professor of chemical engineering at the University of Connecticut, agrees that industrial hemp offers possibilities as a biofuel, but doubts that that would be the most profitable use for hemp.
Parnas created a stir in 2010 with research on using hemp seed oil to create what turned out to be a very viable fuel substitute for petroleum.
"You can make really high-quality biodiesel out of it," he said.
Parnas said he believes that hemp biofuel could work well for less-developed countries that often face a choice between growing crops for food or fuel. UConn also happens to hold a patent on a biodiesel reactor system that could be used to convert hemp into fuel.
The U.S. doesn't have to make that sort of choice, and Connecticut farmers would be better off attempting to grow hemp "for other, higher-value products," Parnas said. He thinks farmers might make a profit by growing hemp for seeds that could be marketed as food or nutritional supplements. "They actually taste great," he said.
It was exactly that idea that led some of Ziobron's constituents to approach her about pro-hemp legislation.
Ziobron said she was contacted by a couple involved in organic foods and health products who were looking for "a new business opportunity." She said their discussions about sustainable crops "all kept pointing back to industrial hemp."
"I wondered what the possibilities would be for growing hemp here in Connecticut," Ziobron said.
Next month, when the state's report is handed to the legislature, Ziobron will have her answer and a few Connecticut farmers may soon get the chance to grow hemp like their colonial counterparts did centuries ago.
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