What if Americans could buy cigarettes but were banned from growing tobacco? Buy bread but not allowed to grow wheat? That is the case with industrial hemp, a product in everything from car doors to milk...legally.
Hemp farming was banned in the U.S. decades ago as part of the earliest drug wars. Hemp contains THC, like marijuana. But hemp is not marijuana.
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Monday, May 18, 2009
Editorial by G.M. Sutliff about U.S. Economical Benefits of Indusstrial Hemp
Whenever I'm in our local "health food" market I have a sense of frustration as I walk by the shelves of numerous hemp food products. Hemp growing is effectively banned by federal executive fiat, even as we import quantities of hemp from, mostly, Canada; in effect, this exports thousands of jobs, both agricultural and industrial. The hemp-products market is underdeveloped due to government interference -- an action based on ignorance supported by vested interests.
What are these "vested interests" afraid of? Could it be the paper products that hemp fibers can make, such as shopping bags that now consume about 14 million trees annually? Could it be the timber products that could replace our consumption of trees grown here and overseas? Could it be that hemp growing requires a fraction of the pesticides and herbicides that cotton and other fiber crops require? The readers' guesses are as good as mine.
My point is that none of these proven uses are permitted. Our good governor has ducked the issue by saying it's a federal responsibility.
Libertarian Congressman Ron Paul has introduced a House bill that would reverse our government's shortsighted banning of hemp farming. It is the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2009, HR 1866.
It's my hope that our congressman, Kevin McCarthy, will support this bill; I've written asking for his support. Therein, I couldn't help pointing out to him that this bill is a job stimulus item that doesn't require government funding.
by: GERALD M. SUTLIFF
source
What are these "vested interests" afraid of? Could it be the paper products that hemp fibers can make, such as shopping bags that now consume about 14 million trees annually? Could it be the timber products that could replace our consumption of trees grown here and overseas? Could it be that hemp growing requires a fraction of the pesticides and herbicides that cotton and other fiber crops require? The readers' guesses are as good as mine.
My point is that none of these proven uses are permitted. Our good governor has ducked the issue by saying it's a federal responsibility.
Libertarian Congressman Ron Paul has introduced a House bill that would reverse our government's shortsighted banning of hemp farming. It is the Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2009, HR 1866.
It's my hope that our congressman, Kevin McCarthy, will support this bill; I've written asking for his support. Therein, I couldn't help pointing out to him that this bill is a job stimulus item that doesn't require government funding.
by: GERALD M. SUTLIFF
source
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Your Dog Can Be Green with Industrial Hemp
Hemp has been used industrially for centuries as building material, insulation, textiles, and food, and since now its green properties are so extolled, it is also used to make paper, biodegradable plastics, and biofuel. And now it's being used to make dog beds, accessories, and attire, to replace nylon, poly-blends and even cotton as a preferred fabric. No pesticides are needed for growing, it is almost instantly replenished once picked, and grows in near drought conditions.
One of the neat things about hemp textiles is that they soften over time as they become stronger. I know it seems like it should be the reverse, but that's why hemp is an ecologically superior fabric: it doesn't wear out. It resists not only wear, but stains, and tearing.
[ more on industrial hemp and doggie beds ]
One of the neat things about hemp textiles is that they soften over time as they become stronger. I know it seems like it should be the reverse, but that's why hemp is an ecologically superior fabric: it doesn't wear out. It resists not only wear, but stains, and tearing.
[ more on industrial hemp and doggie beds ]
Industrial Hemp is better than Synthetic Alternatives
Regulation of Industrial Hemp (Cannabis sativa L.), is complicated by the fact that there are two common varieties of the plant with very different properties: the agricultural variety, known by the common name hemp, and the pharmacological variety, marijuana.
Prior to prohibition in the United States, industrial hemp was the subject of considerable excitement and speculation. The same is true today, as lawmakers and stakeholders in many states are considering the potential for reintroducing industrial hemp into the domestic economy.
The environmental performance of industrial hemp products is of particular interest because, to a large degree, environmental inefficiencies impose costs on society as a whole, not just on the producers and consumers of a specific good.
Many commodities which came to replace traditional uses of industrial hemp in the United States in the last century and a half have created significant environmental externalities.
Assessments of industrial hemp as compared to hydrocarbon or other traditional industrial feedstocks show that, generally, hemp requires substantially lower energy demands for manufacturing, is often suited to less-toxic means of processing, provides competitive product performance (especially in terms of durability, light weight, and strength), greater recyclability and/or biodegradability, and a number of value-added applications for byproducts and waste materials at either end of the product life cycle. Unlike petrochemical feedstocks, industrial hemp production offsets carbon dioxide emissions, helping to close the carbon cycle.
The positive aspects of industrial hemp as a crop are considered in the context of countervailing attributes. Performance areas where industrial hemp may have higher average environmental costs than comparable raw materials result from the use of water and fertilizer during the growth stage, greater frequency of soil disturbance (erosion) during cultivation compared to forests and some field crops, and relatively high water use during the manufacturing stage of hemp products.
Overall, social pressure and government mandates for lower dioxin production, lower greenhouse gas emissions, greater bio-based product procurement, and a number of other environmental regulations, seem to directly contradict the wisdom of prohibiting an evidently useful and unique crop like hemp.
article by: Skaidra Smith-Heisters
Prior to prohibition in the United States, industrial hemp was the subject of considerable excitement and speculation. The same is true today, as lawmakers and stakeholders in many states are considering the potential for reintroducing industrial hemp into the domestic economy.
The environmental performance of industrial hemp products is of particular interest because, to a large degree, environmental inefficiencies impose costs on society as a whole, not just on the producers and consumers of a specific good.
Many commodities which came to replace traditional uses of industrial hemp in the United States in the last century and a half have created significant environmental externalities.
Assessments of industrial hemp as compared to hydrocarbon or other traditional industrial feedstocks show that, generally, hemp requires substantially lower energy demands for manufacturing, is often suited to less-toxic means of processing, provides competitive product performance (especially in terms of durability, light weight, and strength), greater recyclability and/or biodegradability, and a number of value-added applications for byproducts and waste materials at either end of the product life cycle. Unlike petrochemical feedstocks, industrial hemp production offsets carbon dioxide emissions, helping to close the carbon cycle.
The positive aspects of industrial hemp as a crop are considered in the context of countervailing attributes. Performance areas where industrial hemp may have higher average environmental costs than comparable raw materials result from the use of water and fertilizer during the growth stage, greater frequency of soil disturbance (erosion) during cultivation compared to forests and some field crops, and relatively high water use during the manufacturing stage of hemp products.
Overall, social pressure and government mandates for lower dioxin production, lower greenhouse gas emissions, greater bio-based product procurement, and a number of other environmental regulations, seem to directly contradict the wisdom of prohibiting an evidently useful and unique crop like hemp.
article by: Skaidra Smith-Heisters
Benefits of Industrial Hemp, Being Ignored by U.S. Government
Industrial Hemp is cheaper, more environmentally-friendly than crops now used to make car parts, jeans
With oil hitting record amounts per barrel and gas prices following, the federal government continues to prohibit U.S. farmers from growing Industrial Hemp, which could be used to efficiently produce biofuels, including cellulosic ethanol.
Hemp is also a cost-effective, environmentally-friendly substitute for polyester, cotton, fiberglass and concrete, according to a new Reason Foundation study that examines hemp's potential uses and the ways other countries are benefitting from it. Industrial hemp production is banned in the U.S. as an archaic consequence of the war on drugs.
"There are numerous environmental advantages to hemp," said Skaidra Smith-Heisters, a policy analyst at Reason Foundation and author of the report. "Hemp often requires less energy to manufacture into products. It is less toxic to process. And it is easier to recycle and more biodegradable than most competing crops and products. Unfortunately, we won't realize the full economic and environmental benefits of hemp until the crop is legal in the United States."
The Reason Foundation study reveals that polyester fiber manufacturing requires six times the energy needed to grow hemp. And cotton is one of the most "water- and pesticide-intensive crops in the world." Hemp's naturally higher resistance to weeds and pests means it requires dramatically fewer pesticides than cotton.
Not only has the government banned hemp production in the U.S., it is also directly subsidizing other crops that the study shows to be "environmentally inferior." Corn farmers received $51 billion in subsidies between 1995 and 2005; wheat farmers were given $21 billion; cotton farmers fleeced taxpayers for $15 billion; and tobacco farmers were handed $530 million in taxpayer-funded subsidies.
The Reason study says the Drug Enforcement Administration's inability to distinguish between industrial hemp and marijuana is irrational and ignores scientific fact. The report states, "Marijuana cultivated for drug value contains between 3 and 10 percent of the active ingredient, tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC. Industrial hemp typically contains 0.3 percent or less of this active ingredient-as a result, it has no value as a drug."
from Reason Foundation: article source
With oil hitting record amounts per barrel and gas prices following, the federal government continues to prohibit U.S. farmers from growing Industrial Hemp, which could be used to efficiently produce biofuels, including cellulosic ethanol.
Hemp is also a cost-effective, environmentally-friendly substitute for polyester, cotton, fiberglass and concrete, according to a new Reason Foundation study that examines hemp's potential uses and the ways other countries are benefitting from it. Industrial hemp production is banned in the U.S. as an archaic consequence of the war on drugs.
"There are numerous environmental advantages to hemp," said Skaidra Smith-Heisters, a policy analyst at Reason Foundation and author of the report. "Hemp often requires less energy to manufacture into products. It is less toxic to process. And it is easier to recycle and more biodegradable than most competing crops and products. Unfortunately, we won't realize the full economic and environmental benefits of hemp until the crop is legal in the United States."
The Reason Foundation study reveals that polyester fiber manufacturing requires six times the energy needed to grow hemp. And cotton is one of the most "water- and pesticide-intensive crops in the world." Hemp's naturally higher resistance to weeds and pests means it requires dramatically fewer pesticides than cotton.
Not only has the government banned hemp production in the U.S., it is also directly subsidizing other crops that the study shows to be "environmentally inferior." Corn farmers received $51 billion in subsidies between 1995 and 2005; wheat farmers were given $21 billion; cotton farmers fleeced taxpayers for $15 billion; and tobacco farmers were handed $530 million in taxpayer-funded subsidies.
The Reason study says the Drug Enforcement Administration's inability to distinguish between industrial hemp and marijuana is irrational and ignores scientific fact. The report states, "Marijuana cultivated for drug value contains between 3 and 10 percent of the active ingredient, tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC. Industrial hemp typically contains 0.3 percent or less of this active ingredient-as a result, it has no value as a drug."
from Reason Foundation: article source
Thursday, May 7, 2009
China Looks to Industrial Hemp for Poverty Alleviation
After years of sometimes confused policy in which industrial hemp was lumped together with its psychoactive cousin marijuana, the Chinese government is now actively promoting hemp cultivation as a tool for lifting rural Chinese out of poverty.
China will build multiple hemp cultivation bases in Yunnan, Heilongjiang, Gansu and Anhui provinces as well as the autonomous regions of Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia by 2020, a project that is expected to bring three million people out of poverty, according to a Shanghai Daily report citing an official from the People's Liberation Army's General Logistics Department.
Production at one of the first facilities involved in this plan went online yesterday in Menghai County in Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture in southern Yunnan. The hemp fiber processing factory, owned by China Hemp Industrial Holding Co Ltd, has an annual capacity of 2,000 tonnes.
In addition to being used to produce fibers for rope and clothing, hemp can also be used to make paper which is much less damaging to the environment than paper made from trees. Aside from causing deforestation, tree paper is bleached with toxic chlorine bleach. Hemp paper can be bleached with less environmentally harmful hydrogen peroxide.
Industrial hemp can also be used to produce fuel, biodegradable plastics, construction materials and health foods.
The government in Xishuangbanna now provides farmers with free hemp seeds plus technical training. According to the prefecture's party chief Jiang Pusheng, there are nearly 10,000 farmers growing hemp in the area, farmers who through hemp cultivation stand to double their annual income from 2,000 yuan (US$293) to 4,000 yuan.
[ source of article ]
China will build multiple hemp cultivation bases in Yunnan, Heilongjiang, Gansu and Anhui provinces as well as the autonomous regions of Xinjiang and Inner Mongolia by 2020, a project that is expected to bring three million people out of poverty, according to a Shanghai Daily report citing an official from the People's Liberation Army's General Logistics Department.
Production at one of the first facilities involved in this plan went online yesterday in Menghai County in Xishuangbanna Dai Autonomous Prefecture in southern Yunnan. The hemp fiber processing factory, owned by China Hemp Industrial Holding Co Ltd, has an annual capacity of 2,000 tonnes.
In addition to being used to produce fibers for rope and clothing, hemp can also be used to make paper which is much less damaging to the environment than paper made from trees. Aside from causing deforestation, tree paper is bleached with toxic chlorine bleach. Hemp paper can be bleached with less environmentally harmful hydrogen peroxide.
Industrial hemp can also be used to produce fuel, biodegradable plastics, construction materials and health foods.
The government in Xishuangbanna now provides farmers with free hemp seeds plus technical training. According to the prefecture's party chief Jiang Pusheng, there are nearly 10,000 farmers growing hemp in the area, farmers who through hemp cultivation stand to double their annual income from 2,000 yuan (US$293) to 4,000 yuan.
[ source of article ]
Industrial Hemp and Marihuana: The Confusion Reigns
The War on a Plant
By Ed Quillen
POSTED: 04/12/2009 12:30:00 AM MDT
Historians of the future will doubtless marvel that a great and powerful republic, founded in part on "liberty and the pursuit of happiness" but now suffering from difficult economic times would waste billions of dollars every year in a futile war against a humble plant.
That plant, of course, is hemp — source of oil, fiber and a mild psychoactive drug. It's so mild that in all of history, no one has ever died from a marijuana overdose.
And those who used it in their youth, like the three most recent American presidents (Clinton claimed he "didn't inhale," Bush was "young and foolish" in his jejune days, and Obama confessed that "pot had helped" during his youth), somehow managed to go on to reasonably productive lives.
So why is the stuff still illegal?
For one thing, there's an immense federal bureaucracy, the Drug Enforcement Administration, which naturally seeks to stay in business. As long as pot is illegal, the DEA has plenty of work. And when the need arises for a headline to show that the DEA is on the ball, its agents can always drive to some home that uses too much electricity, shoot the dogs, kick in the door, and announce that American youth are protected because it just seized plants with an estimated street value of $4.2 gazillion.
For another, there's our pharmaceutical industry, a major source of campaign contributions. The pill-makers buy candidates so they can protect their revenue streams.
Now, it might be too much to expect the federal government to move sensibly here. There are, after all, two wars and a crumbling economy to contend with. But Colorado could help itself by legalizing the cultivation, sale and use of marijuana with a reasonable excise tax of $25 an ounce.
It would save money in several ways, like lower law-enforcement costs, as well as a reduction in the prison population. Further, the corruption and violence associated with black markets should diminish.
More money would circulate in our state, as Colorado hemp farmers received money now going to Mexican drug cartels. Profitable farms mean that open space gets preserved through market mechanisms, rather than taxes and zoning. Further, it might enhance tourism, at least until other states catch on.
One possible snag is the federal government. No matter how sensible we make our state laws, there would still be draconian and moronic federal laws enforced by federal agents.
So initially, the marijuana excise tax proceeds should go to our state attorney general's office, with instructions that the money be used to defend all Coloradans charged with marijuana violations that are crimes under federal law but not under our enlightened state law.
In other words, every "probable cause" for a search warrant would be vigorously contested. The chain of evidence would come under intense scrutiny. The credibility of informants and agents would be subject to brutal cross-examination.
Every such trial — our tenacious defense teams would never plea-bargain — would be a grinding ordeal for the U.S. Attorney's office. The federal Department of Justice would soon move its prosecutorial resources away from pot and toward real crimes that people care about.
The downside? Maybe a few more lazy potheads munching junk food. But in today's economy, there aren't jobs for them anyway, so where's the harm to society?
Contrast that with the benefits of reduced spending on cops and prisons, a boost to Colorado agriculture, and increased revenue for our hard-pressed state government, if we'd just give up on this silly war against a plant.
By Ed Quillen
POSTED: 04/12/2009 12:30:00 AM MDT
Historians of the future will doubtless marvel that a great and powerful republic, founded in part on "liberty and the pursuit of happiness" but now suffering from difficult economic times would waste billions of dollars every year in a futile war against a humble plant.
That plant, of course, is hemp — source of oil, fiber and a mild psychoactive drug. It's so mild that in all of history, no one has ever died from a marijuana overdose.
And those who used it in their youth, like the three most recent American presidents (Clinton claimed he "didn't inhale," Bush was "young and foolish" in his jejune days, and Obama confessed that "pot had helped" during his youth), somehow managed to go on to reasonably productive lives.
So why is the stuff still illegal?
For one thing, there's an immense federal bureaucracy, the Drug Enforcement Administration, which naturally seeks to stay in business. As long as pot is illegal, the DEA has plenty of work. And when the need arises for a headline to show that the DEA is on the ball, its agents can always drive to some home that uses too much electricity, shoot the dogs, kick in the door, and announce that American youth are protected because it just seized plants with an estimated street value of $4.2 gazillion.
For another, there's our pharmaceutical industry, a major source of campaign contributions. The pill-makers buy candidates so they can protect their revenue streams.
Now, it might be too much to expect the federal government to move sensibly here. There are, after all, two wars and a crumbling economy to contend with. But Colorado could help itself by legalizing the cultivation, sale and use of marijuana with a reasonable excise tax of $25 an ounce.
It would save money in several ways, like lower law-enforcement costs, as well as a reduction in the prison population. Further, the corruption and violence associated with black markets should diminish.
More money would circulate in our state, as Colorado hemp farmers received money now going to Mexican drug cartels. Profitable farms mean that open space gets preserved through market mechanisms, rather than taxes and zoning. Further, it might enhance tourism, at least until other states catch on.
One possible snag is the federal government. No matter how sensible we make our state laws, there would still be draconian and moronic federal laws enforced by federal agents.
So initially, the marijuana excise tax proceeds should go to our state attorney general's office, with instructions that the money be used to defend all Coloradans charged with marijuana violations that are crimes under federal law but not under our enlightened state law.
In other words, every "probable cause" for a search warrant would be vigorously contested. The chain of evidence would come under intense scrutiny. The credibility of informants and agents would be subject to brutal cross-examination.
Every such trial — our tenacious defense teams would never plea-bargain — would be a grinding ordeal for the U.S. Attorney's office. The federal Department of Justice would soon move its prosecutorial resources away from pot and toward real crimes that people care about.
The downside? Maybe a few more lazy potheads munching junk food. But in today's economy, there aren't jobs for them anyway, so where's the harm to society?
Contrast that with the benefits of reduced spending on cops and prisons, a boost to Colorado agriculture, and increased revenue for our hard-pressed state government, if we'd just give up on this silly war against a plant.
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