Colorado Farmer Shatters Hemp's Fiber Ceiling

Source: agweb.com


In 2013, Ryan Loflin, Springfield, Colo., became the first U.S. farmer since the 1940s to plant and harvest industrial hemp.

Ryan Loflin bet the farm in 2013 and did what no U.S. producer had done for 70 years.

The Springfield, Colo., grower ordered hemp seed by mail from Europe and stockpiled his supply bit by precious bit. When the cache climbed to 1,500 lbs., Loflin, 43, stepped into agriculture’s terra incognita and dotted 60 acres of flat ground in extreme southeastern Colorado with hemp seed. And then he waited for Uncle Sam to come knocking.

No cease and desist letter. No phone call from the feds. No DEA raid. Loflin shattered a fiber ceiling to become the first U.S. farmer since the 1940s to plant and harvest industrial hemp.

Particularly in an agricultural economy with anemic commodity prices, hemp is beckoning to U.S. farmers. Federal prohibition remains in place, but states are moving forward with legalization. Despite a storied crop history lasting until 1937 (Hemp briefly returned to U.S. fields during World War ll), industrial hemp production was banned partly due to marijuana association. Both are part of the Cannabis sativa family, yet hemp is marijuana’s non-intoxicating cousin – distinct in chemical and genetic makeup.

Hemp and hypocrisy are tight bedfellows of U.S. policy: Process, buy, manufacture, or even eat hemp products, but don’t dare to grow. As hemp industries in more than 30 countries benefit from the U.S. agriculture market, American farmers have watched from the sidelines as foreign product boosted the U.S.’s position as the world’s top consumer market for hemp goods. The hemp void is filled by farmers from Canada, China and Europe.

The Hemp Apostle

As a child of the 1980s, Loflin was left with a bitter farming taste from a dire decade of agricultural economics. He left farming for construction, but began researching hemp after reading about big returns gained by producers in Canada. “We made $40 per acre off wheat, but I saw Canadian farmers pulling in $300 per acre from hemp, and it blew me away,” he explains. “I studied it and learned all I could.”

Loflin leased the family farm from his father prior to 2013, pulled back in by the potential of hemp and the promises of diversification. "The family farm is where the blood meets the soil. Americans don’t realize the sacrifices and commitment farmers make to put food on their tables. Industrial hemp farming allows the family farmer to reap more benefits from an extremely dangerous and very different occupation,” he describes.

There was no crying in the wilderness for Loflin. He seized the mantle as a hemp apostle and went straight to the halls of legislation at both the state and federal levels as a hemp farming advocate. Colorado legalized recreational marijuana use with passage of Amendment 64 in 2013, and although cultivation of industrial hemp was included in the last line of the bill, regulatory rules were absent. In essence, hemp farming was almost legal in Colorado, but still illegal at a federal level. Regardless, the door was opened wide enough for Loflin.

From his initial 60 acres, he kept the seed for stock and sold some of the cannabinoids for medicine. He believes the pharmaceutical market will become a major income generator for hemp production. In 2016, Loflin ramped up to 520 acres: 120 for seed and 400 for medicine. He hopes for 600-1,000 lbs. of seed per acre, contingent on cultivar. “Farmers are very curious and want to know the returns from hemp. There’s good money in seed and you can pull $300 per acre right now at a minimum, but the potential is there for $1,800 per acre and even higher,” Loflin says.

From the hemp base to the tip of the leaves, all of the plant has harvest purposes due to its fibrous nature. The seeds can be eaten or pressed for oil extraction. The stalk fiber is used in a multitude of ways: paper, textiles, clothing, construction, health products and much more. Even the root can be processed and ground up as a lotion ingredient. In addition to meeting market demands, hemp is an excellent phytoremediation crop – cleaning soils that have been polluted. “Hemp makes a great rotational crop and may be a great fit between corn and wheat,” he adds. “It also grows tremendously well behind alfalfa from all the nitrogen in the soil.”

Regulatory Logjam

Twenty-nine states have passed legislation allowing hemp cultivation for research or pilot programs. However, political wheels invariably turn slowly, and hemp lacks a federal green light. Eric Steenstra, executive director of the Hemp Industries Association, believes once hemp receives the full legal nod, it will emerge as a niche crop and mature into a major earner for producers. “The hemp seed industry already has momentum. The food and body care markets have grown to several hundred million dollars, entirely based on imports. Manufacturing potential will jump when growers can supply domestic hemp and bypass imports. Add the fiber component and the potential leaps to millions of acres in just 20 years.”

Producers consistently ask Steenstra why hemp cultivation is still illegal in so many states. “It makes no sense to farmers and I tell them to call or send emails to their senators and reps. Online, they can go to votehemp.com and get involved,” he says.

Hemp potential covers the entire corn and soybean region. As a summer annual, it fits very well with corn-soy rotations for hemp purposes, or with corn-soy-wheat as another grain crop, says David Williams, a professor of agronomy with the University of Kentucky.

Producers choose hemp for one of three purposes: seed, fiber, or medicine. With fiber, hemp should bring a minimum yield of 6,000 lbs. per acre, but Williams shoots for 5 tons per acre. He says 5 tons per acre of hemp fiber yield will definitely compete with corn and soybean profits. “Hemp is a great rotation alternative and a producer won’t lose money. For seed and fiber, it’s always going to be competitive with other crops.”

Hemp produces cannabinoid molecules (nicotine from tobacco; cannabinoids from hemp) with strong potential for pharmaceutical or nutraceutical applications. The economics of fiber and seed are relatively firm with established industries in Europe and Canada. On the flip side, the economics of cannabinoids are very poorly understood, Williams says. “Regulation is under evaluation by the federal government. Lots of companies want to market cannabinoids, but that avenue is yet to widen and the potential market is hanging.”

Farming veterans are taking a long look at hemp in Kentucky, Williams says. When he holds educational meetings on hemp, the venues are typically packed with 50 to 150 farmers, regardless of county. And grower interest is not necessarily from the younger generation. In the 1940s, many farmers with large scale corn farms grew hemp as part of the Hemp for Victory campaign during World War ll, according to Williams. Some older growers still remember their grandfathers growing hemp. “I don’t expect hemp to absolutely transform the ag economy. Yet, it definitely has potential as a rotation crop, and the medicinal aspect may bring further opportunity,” he says.

Open-door Crop

In addition to hemp, Loflin farms alfalfa, triticale and grain sorghum on dark, sandy loam across 1,000 acres of level land set against the endless vista of Baca County, a 1930s Dust Bowl epicenter where the mountains have turned to plains. He calls hemp an “open-door” crop, with multiple avenues of opportunity. “It’s a complete economic and agronomic hand-in-hand crop. I think hemp will take off with processing plants. When farmers have a place to go with their hemp, it’s going to make a difference and it will grow almost anywhere. It sounds cliché, but it’s the perfect agriculture time for hemp to arrive.”

In 2013, Loflin planted in the shadow of history, but he’s confident the initial 60 hemp acres will spur a long-term harvest well into the future. “The hemp industry is running a marathon, not a sprint,” Loflin adds. “Hemp is a solution to many long-term problems we face in farming’s future. With time, hemp will be a driving force in agribusiness."

Rhode Island Legalizes Hemp!

By Benjamin M. Adams
Source: cannabisnowmagazine.com

Rhode Island’s legislative session ends with legal hemp, licensed medical growers, PTSD added to medical marijuana program; adult-use back next year

Rhode Island is set to join America’s industrial hemp revolution after a legislative vote June 20 to legalize the agriculture.

In final days of its annual session this week, state lawmakers also licensed medical pot growers, and added post-traumatic stress disorder to the state’s medical marijuana program — bolstering support for the sometimes controversial use of medical cannabis. The measures go to Governor Gina Raimondo for approval.

Adult-use legalization was also on the table in the Rhode Island legislature this year, but the session expired this week before The Marijuana Regulation, Control, and Taxation Act was voted on. A recent poll indicates 55 percent of Rhode Islanders said they support regulating marijuana for adults like alcohol.

Under Rhode Island law, hemp will be defined as cannabis containing less than three-tenths of one percent THC, or less. (Medically active cannabis can be up to about 25% THC, cannabis’ main active ingredient.)

The Rhode Island legislature closed up the 2016 legislative session early Saturday morning, after thirteen hours of deliberation.

“Still here @RISenate @ 5:45am from 6/17 in final day of Legislative session. I think we are going for a record,” Senator Juan M. Pichardo tweeted. The state’s Senate and House worked out details of the state’s budget.

Before deadline, lawmakers also tweaked the state’s medical cannabis program to create licensed medical cannabis farmers, and a tag system for the state’s legal pot plants. The tiny state has three dispensaries.

Adult use advocacy group Regulate Rhode Island, along with its coalition, will have to wait until next year’s session. It’s the sixth consecutive year a marijuana legalization bill has failed in America’s smallest state.

Regulate Rhode Island director Jared Moffat says they plan on continuing their efforts to re-introduce a bill next year.

The War On Weed Is Winding Down - But Will Monsanto Be The Winner?

By Ellen Brown

Source: counterpunch.org

In April, Pennsylvania became the 24^th state to legalize medical cannabis, a form of the plant popularly known as marijuana. That makes nearly half of US states. A major barrier to broader legalization has been the federal law under which all cannabis – even the very useful form known as industrial hemp – is classed as a Schedule I controlled substance that cannot legally be grown in the US. But that classification could change soon. In a letter sent to federal lawmakers in April, the US Drug Enforcement Administration said it plans to release a decision on rescheduling marijuana in the first half of 2016.

The presidential candidates are generally in favor of relaxing the law. In November 2015, Senator Bernie Sanders introduced a bill that would repeal all federal penalties for possessing and growing the plant, allowing states to establish their own marijuana laws. Hillary Clinton would not go that far but would drop cannabis from a Schedule I drug (a deadly dangerous drug with no medical use and high potential for abuse) to Schedule II (a deadly dangerous drug with medical use and high potential for abuse). Republican candidate Donald Trump says we are losing badly in the war on drugs, and that to win that war all drugs need to be legalized.

But it is Green Party presidential candidate Dr. Jill Stein who has been called “weed’s biggest fan.” Speaking from the perspective of a physician and public health advocate, Stein notes that hundreds of thousands of patients suffering from chronic pain and cancers are benefiting from the availability of medical marijuana under state laws. State economies are benefiting as well. She cites Colorado, where retail marijuana stores first opened in January 2014. Since then, Colorado’s crime rates and traffic fatalities have dropped; and tax revenue, economic output from retail marijuana sales, and jobs have increased.

Among other arguments for changing federal law is that the marijuana business currently lacks access to banking facilities. Most banks, fearful of FDIC sanctions, won’t work with the $6.7 billion marijuana industry, leaving 70% of cannabis companies without bank accounts. That means billions of dollars are sitting around in cash, encouraging tax evasion and inviting theft, to which an estimated 10% of profits are lost. But that problem too could be remedied soon. On June 16, the Senate Appropriations Committee approved an amendment to prevent the Treasury Department from punishing banks that open accounts for state-legal marijuana businesses.

Boosting trade in the new marijuana market is not a good reason for decriminalizing it, of course, if it actually poses a grave danger to health. But there have been no recorded deaths from cannabis overdose in the US. Not that the herb can’t have problematic effects, but the hazards pale compared to alcohol (30,000 deaths annually) and to patented pharmaceuticals, which are now the leading cause of death from drug overdose. Prescription drugs taken as directed are estimated to kill 100,000 Americans per year.

Behind the War on Weed:  Taking Down the World’s Largest Agricultural Crop

The greatest threat to health posed by marijuana seems to come from its criminalization. Today over 50 percent of inmates in federal prison are there for drug offenses, and marijuana tops the list. Cannabis cannot legally be grown in the US even as hemp, a form with very low psychoactivity. Why not? The answer seems to have more to do with economic competition and racism than with health.

Cannabis is actually one of the oldest domesticated crops, having been grown for industrial and medicinal purposes for millennia. Until 1883,hemp was also one of the largest agricultural crops (some say the largest). It was the material from which most fabric, soap, fuel, paper and fiber were made. Before 1937, it was also a component of at least 2,000 medicines.

In early America, it was considered a farmer’s patriotic duty to grow hemp. Cannabis was legal tender in most of the Americas from 1631 until the early 1800s. Americans could even pay their taxes with it. Benjamin Franklin’s paper mill used cannabis. Hemp crops produce nearly four times as much raw fiber as equivalent tree plantations; and hemp paper is finer, stronger and lasts longer than wood-based paper. Hemp was also an essential resource for any country with a shipping industry, since it was the material from which sails and rope were made.

Today hemp is legally grown for industrial use in hundreds of countries outside the US. A 1938 article in Popular Mechanics claimed it was a billion-dollar crop (the equivalent of about $16 billion today), useful in 25,000 products ranging from dynamite to cellophane. New uses continue to be found. Claims include eliminating smog from fuels, creating a cleaner energy source that can replace nuclear power, removing radioactive water from the soil, eliminating deforestation, and providing a very nutritious food source for humans and animals.

To powerful competitors, the plant’s myriad uses seem to have been the problem. Cannabis competed with the lumber industry, the oil industry, the cotton industry, the petrochemical industry and the pharmaceutical industry. In the 1930s, the plant in all its forms came under attack.

Its demonization accompanied the demonization of Mexican immigrants, who were then flooding over the border and were widely perceived to be a threat. Pot smoking was part of their indigenous culture. Harry Anslinger, called “the father of the war on weed,” was the first commissioner of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, a predecessor to the Drug Enforcement Administration. He fully embraced racism as a tool for demonizing marijuana. He made such comments as “marijuana causes white women to seek sexual relations with Negroes, entertainers and any others,” and “Reefer makes darkies think they’re as good as white men.”

In 1937, sensational racist claims like these caused recreational marijuana to be banned; and industrial hemp was banned with it.

Classification as a Schedule I controlled substance came in the 1970s, with President Richard Nixon’s War on Drugs. The Shafer Commission, tasked with giving a final report, recommended against the classification; but Nixon ignored the commission.

According to an April 2016 article in Harper’s Magazine, the War on Drugs had political motives. Top Nixon aide John Ehrlichman is quoted as saying in a 1994 interview:

The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. . . . We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.

Competitor or Attractive New Market for the Pharmaceutical Industry?

The documented medical use of cannabis goes back two thousand years, but the Schedule I ban has seriously hampered medical research. Despite that obstacle, cannabis has now been shown to have significant therapeutic value for a wide range of medical conditions, including cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, multiple sclerosis, epilepsy, glaucoma, lung disease, anxiety, muscle spasms, hepatitis C, inflammatory bowel disease, and arthritis pain.

New research has also revealed the mechanism for these wide-ranging effects. It seems the active pharmacological components of the plant mimic chemicals produced naturally by the body called endocannabinoids. These chemicals are responsible for keeping critical biological functions in balance, including sleep, appetite, the immune system, and pain. When stress throws those functions off, the endocannabinoids move in to restore balance.

Inflammation is a common trigger of the disease process in a broad range of degenerative ailments. Stress triggers inflammation, and cannabis relieves both inflammation and stress. THC, the primary psychoactive component of the plant, has been found to have twenty times the anti-inflammatory power of aspirin and twice that of hydrocortisone.

CBD, the most-studied non-psychoactive component, also comes with an impressive list of therapeutic benefits, including not against cancer but as a super-antibiotic. CBD has been shown to kill “superbugs” that are resistant to currently available drugs. This is a major medical breakthrough, since for some serious diseases antibiotics have reached the end of their usefulness.

Behind the Push for Legalization

The pharmaceutical industry both has much to gain and much to lose from legalization of the cannabis plant in its various natural forms. Patented pharmaceuticals have succeeded in monopolizing the drug market globally. What that industry does not want is to be competing with a natural plant that anyone can grow in his backyard, which actually works better than very expensive pharmaceuticals without side effects.

Letitia Pepper, who suffers from multiple sclerosis, is a case in point. A vocal advocate for the decriminalization of marijuana for personal use, she says she has saved her insurance company $600,000 in the last nine years, using medical marijuana in place of a wide variety of prescription drugs to treat her otherwise crippling disease. That is $600,000 the pharmaceutical industry has not made, on just one patient. There are 400,000 MS sufferers in the US, and 20 million people who have been diagnosed with cancer sometime in their lives. Cancer chemotherapy is the biggest of big business, which would be directly threatened by a cheap natural plant-based alternative.

The threat to big industry profits could explain why cannabis has been kept off the market for so long. More suspicious to Pepper and other observers is the sudden push to legalize it. They question whether Big Pharma would allow the competition, unless it had an ace up its sleeve. Although the movement for marijuana legalization is a decades-old grassroots effort, the big money behind the recent push has come from a few very wealthy individuals with links to Monsanto, the world’s largest seed company and producer of genetically modified seeds. In May of this year, Bayer AG, the giant German chemical and pharmaceutical company, made a bid to buy Monsanto. Both companies are said to be working on a cannabis-based extract.

Natural health writer Mike Adams warns:

[W]ith the cannabis industry predicted to generate over $13 billion by 2020, becoming one of the largest agricultural markets in the nation, there should be little doubt that companies like Monsanto are simply waiting for Uncle Sam to remove the herb from its current Schedule I classification before getting into the business.

. . . [O]ther major American commodities, like corn and soybeans, are on average between 88 and 91 percent genetically modified. Therefore, once the cannabis industry goes national, and that is most certainly primed to happen, there will be no stopping the inevitability of cannabis becoming a prostituted product of mad science and shady corporate monopoly tactics.

With the health benefits of cannabis now well established, the battlefield has shifted from its decriminalization to who can grow it, sell it, and prescribe it. Under existing California law, patients like Pepper are able to grow and use the plant essentially for free. New bills purporting to legalize marijuana for recreational use impose regulations that opponents say would squeeze home growers and small farmers out of the market, would heighten criminal sanctions for violations, and could wind up replacing the natural cannabis plant with patented, genetically modified (GMO) plants that must be purchased year after year. These new bills and the Monsanto/Bayer connection will be the subject of a follow-up article.

Stay tuned.

Ellen Brown is an attorney, founder of the Public Banking Institute, and author of twelve books including the best-selling Web of Debt. Her latest book, The Public Bank Solution, explores successful public banking models historically and globally. Her 300+ blog articles are at EllenBrown.com.

TREAT ACNE WITH CANNABIS

By Alice Klee
Source: greenrushdaily.com

ACNE AND CANNABIS

Is cannabis a wonder-cure for acne? Some products containing cannabinoids are meant to cure acne, and the reviews are quite phenomenal. The fact is, cannabinoids offer something that other products and chemicals and ingredients cannot.

It is commonly speculated that smoking weed causes acne to occur. Since smoking pot can increase testosterone, it can cause a hormonal imbalance, one of the more common causes of acne.

Cannabinoids

Using cannabinoids topically, however, is a different story – in the same way, that brushing your teeth with cannabinoids can be great for your oral health. Hemp contains cannabidiol or CBD.

It contains more of this compound than weed and contains very little THC. CBD acts as an anti-inflammatory. It is an excellent ingredient in some hemp body care products, such as toothpaste.

Hemp Seed Oil

Hemp seed oil is one of the best antioxidants out there – it has higher levels of antioxidant than any other vegetable oil. It has a comedogenic rating of zero, meaning it can do no harm to oily, clogged pores – only help.

It is also full of very helpful minerals, like magnesium, potassium, and calcium. Antioxidants are fantastic for skin. It keeps skin balanced and in check – acne free, and also free of the effects of aging.

Hemp seed oil also contains linoleic acid, which keeps sebum in balance in the skin. When our diets lack enough of this, sebum gets out of whack, causing clogged pores and general grossness.

This will cause us to break out. This makes hemp seed oil not only a remarkable ingredient in skin care products, but a great ingredient to bake with, cook with, and consume in general – adding linoleic acid to your diet will make your skin healthier.

Cannabinoid skin treatments can cure acne, but also are great for reducing signs of aging, like wrinkles. Antioxidants can do quite a bit.

Doctors have also speculated that marijuana can have a positive effect on your skin, regardless of how you consume it. Why? Because smoking marijuana can release neurotransmitters such as serotonin.

The feel-good effect ends up being a positive, for your mind and body; even if you are hitting a joint or a bong to acquire them. The release of neurotransmitters like this makes for a healthy glow.

Make Your Mask

There are a few products on the market that contain hemp that is meant to treat acne. But you can make an awesome mask with hemp oil or cannabis oil yourself. Here’s how:

• 1 ripe avocado
• 1/4 cup of cannabis oil, hemp seed oil, or cannabis infused coconut oil
• a few drops of lavender, peppermint, or tea tree oil – to make it smell nice
• your hands or a makeup brush, to apply

Cut the avocado in half, remove the pit, and mash up the green stuff in a bowl or with a blender. Mix in the rest of the ingredients. (It will work with a bowl, but be a much finer blend / be a lot less work with a blender.)

Use a steam treatment to open up your pores, to intensify the effects. To do this, just boil some water and let your face absorb some steam. Apply the mask and leave on skin for 10 – 20 minutes. Wash off and pat dry.

Minnesota is back in the hemp business

By Lindsey Seavert 
Source: kare11.com

HASTINGS, Minn. – Last week, John Strohfus became part of state history as the Hastings-based farmer had the honor of planting the first industrial hemp crop in Minnesota since 1950.

The business consultant and second generation small family farmer received the hemp seeds from Canada last week as one of seven farms participating in the Minnesota Department of Agriculture's industrial hemp pilot program.

“Being first is really important in the industry. The reason we haven’t planted in Minnesota is because it’s been outlawed because of a federal ban. With the United States being the number-one importer of industrial hemp, why we couldn’t grow it here in the United States has been baffling to the agriculture community,” said Strohfus.

Minnesota banned hemp production when it was swept up in the federal drug ban six decades ago, but the 2014 passage of a federal farm bill and state legislation in 2015 paved the way for growth.

John Strohfus looks over one of his two hemp fields. He's the first to plant industrial hemp in Minnesota since 1950.   (Photo: KARE 11)

“I'm sort of an entrepreneurial spirit, I always have been. It's essentially a new opportunity to have a new start-up company, and a new whole industry to grow quickly in the state of Minnesota,” said Strohfus.

Strohfus planted hemp seeds across 18 acres in two secure locations, and after four days of growth, the tiny plants have already sprouted more than two inches.

“You can see the leaf is already developed and the traditional cannabis leaf,” he said, holding the small plant between his fingers.

“This will grow very quickly and very tall,” said Strohfus, who said his hemp variety will grow up to four inches a day in the 100-day growing season, and to about six feet tall by the time it’s harvested in September.

But what Stropfus hopes disappears just as fast is the stigma of a cannabis plant considered to be the distant cousin of marijuana.

  (Photo: KARE 11)

“The THC level in industrial hemp is .3 percent, and it's 5 to 6 percent or even higher in marijuana so you would basically would have to smoke a whole field of it, and probably not even have an effect,” said Strohfus.

Still, the state of Minnesota had to work closely with the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), since hemp is still considered a Schedule I narcotic. The Minnesota hemp producers had to undergo background checks, become licensed and registered with the state, and even work with local law enforcement for security purposes.

“It’s been kind of a challenging ride,” said Andrea Vaubel, Minnesota Department of Agriculture Assistant Commissioner. “But this is very exciting, a huge deal for Minnesota.”

Vaubel says with all the potential from hemp - products ranging from plastics, construction materials, clothing, food and paper - Minnesota sees economic gain.

“Canada has a $500 million dollars hemp industry, and so there are other states tapping into that, there is a lot of growth from Minnesota, our farmers can tap into that, and diversify our crops,” said Vaubel.

John Strohfus plans to produce hemp health food, to be used as a snack or mixed into items like salad and yogurt, but his emerging company will also process the fiber, utilizing every part of the hemp plant.

Strohfus is working with a farming partner Ben Thurmes, also from Hastings, as well as collaborating his industrial hemp business with Ken Anderson, a Minnesota native who has spearheaded hemp start-ups in other states, such as Kentucky.

Today, a total of 28 states are studying industrial help pilot programs, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures. The state will monitor the hemp fields and study the growth scientifically, as well as track the marketing of hemp.

“I'm hopeful, in future planting years, it will open up and we won’t need that oversight, and there’s federal lobbying going on right now to get industrial hemp classified and removed from the Schedule I narcotic list,” added Strohfus.

After a long wait, Strohfus sees a quickly cultivated industry, from soil to shelf.

“I’m fairly impatient so hemp is suited for me, there’s instant gratification seeing it four days later lined up in rows, so kind of fun,” said Strohfus.

As the pilot project kicks off, two tractor companies, Value Implement of Ellsworth, Wisconsin and Niebur Implement of Miesville, Minnesota donated $400,000 worth of cutting edge equipment to Strohfus’ farm to place the hemp seeds precisely and to help best experiment how to plant the crop for other Minnesota farmers in the future.

Hemp Herder Derek Owen

By David Mendelsohn
Source: nhmagazine.com


Derek Owen and his wife Ruth work their 150-acre farm in Hopkinton. It used to be larger, but taxes tend to shrink the terrain. Still, it’s a busy and friendly place. Owen was elected to the NH Legislature and served for 20 years. He has long advocated for industrial hemp (think rope, not dope) as a legal crop. He remains hopeful and has a field set aside for whenever the government wises up.

In his own words:

• No, I don’t mind a bit if you mention my age. I am 85. I can still dance.
• My college roommate introduced me to Ruth when both were students at UNH around March of ‘62, and we got married in September … a fast romance.
• We’ve got five kids, two of whom live in New York. I don’t know just what they do.
• Our farm labor pool includes young people who want to find out about life, how to live with other people and get along … Often that facet is more important than learning about organic farming.
• Sometimes people come for a visit and stay for years.  Sometimes exchange students have come from other countries … France, Germany, Japan, Africa, Nepal.
• I was in office from 1992-2012. I ran the first time to see if I could help get some relief from the unfair property tax. Unfortunately, after 20 years, I still hadn’t gotten anywhere. People are still losing their homes.
• I either sponsored or co-sponsored a bill relative to the industrial growing of hemp every single term.
• Hemp goes back to early China and the Egyptians.
• Betsy Ross used it when she made the first American flag. George Washington farmed it. The paper of the Constitution was made from hemp. It’s used as animal food. It’s the strongest natural rope known to man.
• Hemp is also used for body products, human food, animal fodder, and animal bedding and clothing. It produces 10 times the amount of pulp that wood does for making paper. It’s good for the environment
• The federal government is opposed to its growth because of ignorance. Hemp is not marijuana. It is not psychoactive. It is a fibrous plant with unlimited uses, and the American farmer is being denied the right to grow this cash crop.
• Like cannabis is today, growing hemp should be a state-by-state movement. It is no threat to anyone.

Owen says his trademark “Farm Here to Eternity” hat was originally found at the Mall of NH by a couple of foreign exchange students from Brazil and Kazakhstan who were staying at his farm. “They bought it and brought it home as a present. With that inscription, it fit me perfectly. I finally wore it out and had more made.”

At right, the photographer and his lovely assistant serve as hat holders.

To Hear The Founding Fathers Tell It, Hemp Can Make America Great Again

By Chad Blair
Source: civilbeat.org

States like Hawaii are loosening restrictions on industrial hemp, but the real breakthrough could come at the federal level.

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Sitting on the wide green lawn that separates the U.S. Capitol and the Supreme Court building, Eric Steenstra handed over a pocket-size copy of the U.S. Constitution made from hemp paper.

“Tree-free hemp-blended paper,” to be exact, and made in America.

Steenstra is president of Vote Hemp, a single-issue nonprofit founded in 2000 to remove barriers to industrial hemp farming in the United States. Vote Hemp is perhaps the leading organization dedicated to changing hemp laws, helped by nationwide grassroots networking and its location in the Washington, D.C., area.

“Check it out,” Steenstra said, indicating the Constitution.

In addition to the familiar text (the one that begins, “We the People of the United States …”) the inside cover includes quotes from the first three U.S. presidents extolling hemp’s virtues.

Products made from hemp include soap, milk, seeds and snacks.

Chad Blair/Civil Beat

“Make the most you can of the Indian Hemp seed and sow it everywhere,” said George Washington, who cultivated hemp at nearby Mount Vernon his entire life for industrial purposes — for fibers to make rope, sailing canvas, clothing and fishing nets.

“Hemp is the first necessity to the wealth and protection of the country,” said fellow agronomist Thomas Jefferson.

But hemp cannot be commercially produced legally in the United States, even though U.S. hemp-based products accounted for about $600 million in sales in 2015. Instead, it must be imported from Canada, Europe, Asia and elsewhere at the cost of about $76 million, according to U.S. senators such as Jeff Merkley, D-Ore.

That’s because hemp is part of the cannabis plant, which produces marijuana, which is a forbidden drug at the federal level akin to heroin, LSD, Ecstasy and peyote.

“Make the most you can of the Indian Hemp seed and sow it everywhere.” — George Washington

But hemp won’t get you high. As a hemp advocate told The Marijuana Times earlier this year, “You can smoke all 3 acres of my hemp farm and your lungs would give out before getting high.”

Hemp contains less than .3 percent tetrahydrocannabinol — THC — the ingredient in pot that gets you buzzed. Even though they are from the same plant, hemp and marijuana are genetically different and are cultivated differently.

If advocates like Steenstra are successful, hemp’s federal status could soon be changing.

Eric Steenstra, president of Vote Hemp, points to the founding fathers as early supporters of hemp products.

Cory Lum/Civil Beat

From Hawaii To Kentucky

Twenty-nine states, including Hawaii, have moved to define industrial hemp as distinct from marijuana and removed barriers to production.

Legislation establishing an industrial hemp pilot program to allow its cultivation and distribution of its seed in Hawaii for research purposes unanimously passed the Legislature last month and awaits Gov. David Ige’s signature.

At the federal level, 70 members of the U.S. House of Representatives (including Democrats Tulsi Gabbard and Mark Takai from Hawaii) and 14 members of the U.S. Senate (including Democrats Mazie Hirono and Brian Schatz from Hawaii) are backing versions of an Industrial Hemp Farming Act.

The legislation would remove hemp from the Schedule I controlled substance list and define it as a non-drug so long as it contains less than .3 percent THC.

While political polarization has perhaps never been greater in D.C., the legislation is co-sponsored by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell in the Senate and Rep. Thomas Massie in the House. Both are Republicans and both hail from Kentucky, which is among the states most focused on developing industrial hemp.

“Mitch McConnell was not in favor of hemp five years ago, but he has really come around and changed his view,” said Steenstra, who lobbies on Capitol Hill. “He’s a true champion.”

Steenstra credits McConnell’s fellow GOP senator, Rand Paul, and James Comer, Kentucky’s former agriculture commissioner who this year is a GOP candidate for Congress, for persuading McConnell to embrace hemp.

“Hemp is the first necessity to the wealth and protection of the country.” —Thomas Jefferson

“Kentucky has a unique, historic hemp crop, and Comer saw that they could create a lot of jobs and help farming and manufacturing in the state,” said Steenstra.

Meanwhile, the Hemp Industries Association — a nonprofit trade group representing businesses, farmers researchers and investors — and allies earlier this month filed a petition with the Drug Enforcement Administration to remove industrial hemp plants from the schedules established under the Controlled Substances Act of 1970.

Steenstra says changing the federal designation for hemp is critical, and it’s something that the DEA can do on its own.

“But to fix this, to really solve it, we need Congress to step in,” he said.

Rep. Cynthia Thielen assists University of Hawaii staff members in the first harvest of the Industrial Hemp Field at the UH Waimanalo Research Station in July 2015.

Cory Lum/Civil Beat

10,000 Years Of Hemp

Hemp, according to the Hemp Industries Association, “is among the oldest industries on the planet, going back more than 10,000 years to the beginnings of pottery.” In addition to Washington and Jefferson growing hemp, farmers were legally required to grow it during the colonial period and into the republic for economic purposes.

“We shall, by and by, want a world of hemp more for our own consumption,” said John Adams.

But in 1937, Congress passed the Marihuana Tax Act (yes, spelled with an “h” instead of a “j”), which began the era of hemp prohibition. A brief respite came during World War II, when the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor cut off hemp fiber supplies from the Philippines.

To understand that period, Steenstra encourages folks to watch a short film called “Hemp For Victory,” which was shown during the war to encourage U.S. farmers to grow hemp for the war effort.

What’s so great about hemp? Vote Hemp and the Hemp Industries Association identify a number of attributes:

• “Hemp is a renewable resource that can help reduce market dependency on synthetics, lumber, cotton and other non-sustainable industrial materials.
• “Hemp contributes to environmentally responsible food and fiber production, forest conservation, reduction in agricultural pesticide use, and soil remediation.
• “Hemp sequesters carbon from the atmosphere thus mitigating the rise of CO2 levels responsible for climate change.
• “Hemp seed products are among the fastest-growing categories in the natural foods industry and are rich in healthy Omega-3 essential fatty acids, highly-digestible protein and naturally occurring vitamins and minerals, such as vitamin E and iron.”

A tent at the entrance of the Marijuana Expo held at the Hawaii Convention Center in July 2015.

Cory Lum/Civil Beat

There are also a lot of myths the industrial hemp folks aim to dispel. Here’s one example:

Myth: Legalizing hemp while continuing the prohibition on marijuana would burden local police forces.

Reality: In countries where hemp is grown as an agricultural crop, the police have experienced no such burdens.

Hemp’s chances to become a viable U.S. crop again changed dramatically two years ago, when Congress passed the 2014 Farm Bill. An amendment to the bill defined industrial hemp as distinct from the cannabis sativa L. — that is, stating that industrial hemp is not psychoactive.

The Farm Bill allowed for states that have already legalized the crop to cultivate hemp “within the parameters” of state agriculture departments and research institutions.

In Hawaii, state Rep. Cynthia Thielen, a Republican, and state Sen. Mike Gabbard, a Democrat, spearheaded the hemp pilot project legislation that now awaits the governor’s action. If signed into law, it would appropriate funds for administrative costs within the state’s Department of Agriculture.

In its committee report on the bill, lawmakers wrote:

Industrial hemp is well suited to Hawaii’s climate and soil and can grow to over ten feet in a short period of time with little water and no pesticides. … Industrial hemp has over 25,000 uses, including food, fiber, and fuel products, and has high potential to contribute to the future viability of the State’s agricultural industry.

The bill has many supporters, including the DOA, the University of Hawaii System and the Hawaii Farm Bureau. And, though it is set to expire in 2021, lawmakers could extend the sunset date, depending on what happens nationally.

Steenstra noted that he was being interviewed during Hemp History Week (June 6-11). The Senate passed a bipartisan resolution to that effect to boost the nation’s agricultural industry and economy.

Lauren Stansbury, spokesperson for Hemp History Week, handed over a bag full of hemp swag like Dr. Bronner’s Pure-Castile Soap (the label reads, “let us be generous, fair and loving to Spaceship Earth”), Natierra’s Dark Chocolate Hemp Seeds (“a superfood snack”) and Living Harvest Hemp Milk (“Non GMO Project Verified”).

“We shall, by and by, want a world of hemp more for our own consumption.” — John Adams

Steenstra then pulled out another booklet printed on tree-free hemp-blended paper. It was titled “Hemp,” and it contained the research of Lyster Dewey, the lead botanist for fiber plant investigations, part of the federal Bureau of Plant Industry back in 1913. Dewey grew and studied hemp, and his test plots were on Arlington Farms, where the Pentagon now stands.

Steenstra’s point was that Washington once led the way on hemp and it can lead the way again. And he credits Hawaii’s lawmakers, too, noting that Alexander & Baldwin has talked about growing industrial hemp on its former sugar cane lands in Central Maui.

“It’s really an incredibly sustainable and versatile crop, and I have no doubt that if Congress and the states remove restrictions and allow it to farm and grow hemp commercially, we will see hemp become one of our major commodity groups in the U.S.”