Cannabis isn’t the only Green Rush…
Hemp, coming to a field near you.
Hemp is one of the most versatile plants known to humankind. In fact, it’s thought to be the first domestically cultivated plant in the world — with evidence stretching back 8,000 years in Mesopotamia.
Unlike its sibling — the “Cannabis” plant we use for medicinal purposes — hemp’s energy is focused on building its fibers (and seeds), not in producing cannabinoids. In fact, Hemp stalks produce some of the strongest natural fibers in the world. In addition to allowing for more durable fiberglass composites in heavy industries, hemp makes superior clothing and paper products — the latter possibly being a factor which led to cannabis prohibition, as hemp-based paper threatened the powerful media magnate William Randolph Hearst’s timber farms which supplied the paper for his newspapers.
Hemp is also incredibly nutritious; the seeds can be consumed on their own or as a hemp seed oil. It’s also a notable source for biofuel production.
And although hemp’s overall cannabinoid levels are incredibly low, with only trace amounts of THC, hemp tends to produce appreciable levels of CBD, a major non-psychoactive cannabinoid with massive therapeutic promise.
Yet with all of this data screaming at us to have millions of acres of hemp fields across America, it is currently illegal to produce hemp for commercial purposes in the United States.
“But wait,” you say, “I own this hemp rope necklace, and I own a hemp shirt I proudly wore at the march last weekend. Where did they come from?”
Those items are part of the $300 million in hemp products imported into the US each year because of current federal laws restricting not just the medical cannabis family of plants, but also hemp. And naturally, the DEA acts as gatekeeper.
We touched on some of the current uses for hemp already — mostly small finished goods due to restrictions and the need for importation. However, with all of the additional use cases we mentioned, domestically grown hemp will quickly take off and build out a robust market. While the global market is estimated to be around $800 million, that number will skyrocket. Hemp may never meet its sister plant, medical cannabis, in regards to market size, but it could be a $3 billion industry in its own right by 2020.
Even more important, hemp farming will create many jobs and can work particularly well in economically blighted, former manufacturing areas. Kentucky is a state already known as a major producer of (currently illicit) medical cannabis. They are banking on the less controversial hemp as their next cash crop. Right now hemp has to be grown for research, but there will be quite a lot of green research coming out of the Bluegrass State in 2017, with 209 applications for 12,800 acres approved for this year. Ultimately, upon the (eventual) end of federal prohibition, early movers like Kentucky will have a huge advantage in this industry.
Pennsylvania is not far behind in their attitudes towards hemp, and recently opened up licenses to grow it. Organizations such as Commonwealth Alternative Medicinal Options (CAMO) who are primarily focused on medical cannabis and research, also see the tremendous value of hemp, and not just for its products: “We are an organization not only focused on medical outcomes and research but also improving the lives of veterans,” says CAMO Founder and Executive Director Matthew Mallory. He continued, “From a veteran employment perspective, we see hemp farming as an ideal industry. Throughout history, the land has called to combat veterans — peacefully working the soil to create life is incredibly healing for someone subjected so intensely to the opposite.”
This Veteran, for one, agrees.
Interested in growing hemp in your state? Or have any other unique or novel uses for it? I’d love to hear about it!
