So every time you hear some obvious pothead college student ranting on about all the benefits of “industrial hemp”, it makes me wonder.
a. If the crop is so amazing at so many things, surely there must be varieties that do not have any THC content (or you could genetically engineer some not to express any THC)
b. This kind of sounds like they just want weed to be legal, and are trying to think of a benefit that those of us who don’t enjoy marijuana could get behind.
What gives? Is industrial hemp really that much more amazing and rapidly growing that some other crop that does the same thing without being illegal?
a. It isn’t worth the bother. Almost anything you can do with hemp you can do with something else, usually cheaper. Same with medical marijuana - the uses are very limited, and generally other stuff is better.
My understanding is that industrial hemp doesn’t have much if any THC, so no need to genetically engineer anything. It’s just related to marijuana, so it’s heavily restricted. Like if broccoli had opium in it so they banned cabbage and brussels sprouts too even though they didn’t have significant amounts of opium, just because they were the same family botanically.
It is frustrating that you basically only hear about hemp from hippies who make extraordinary claims about it. Same with marijuana, actually. It doesn’t cure cancer, guys! Still, plants shouldn’t be illegal, even if they have zero medical or industrial uses.
It’s the same plant, Cannibis sativa but a different cultiver bred to limit THC and enhance CBD. I think the hippies are indulging in some wishful thinking, rather like dope from banana skins.*
I read a book where the writer reminisced about his childhood in the early fifties to the early sixties. He mentioned that instead of cornsilk, they’d dry a weed they called “scribblage” and smoke that in newspaper. Then as an adult he visited a friend in Kentucky and as they traveled down a lane, he spotted scribblage growing wild in the ditch. Asked what it was the host replied, “Oh, that’s wild marijuana; they grew a lot of hemp around here during World War II.” :eek: It was likely industrial hemp, even then.
Industrial hemp produces fibers. It doesn’t do so in a way that is miraculously better than all other fiber crops except in the minds of cherry picking hemp enthusiasts.
Industrial hemp does have value as a crop for fiber and seed. It’s not a miracle plant, but it is much more than a cover for pot enthusiasts.
Check out this group, which we referred to as the “Hemp Republicans” in the early days of the movement.
There’s also the Hemp Industries Association, which is not a marijuana front. (it honestly is “pot friendly,” I’ve been to the conventions)
It does grow fast, and it’s drought resistant and needs little, if any, pesticides. It’s relatively cheap and easy to grow, but difficult to process with existing technology if you’re looking for a cotton substitute or something like that. It has a variety of industrial applications. It’s very low in THC, so there is no danger that someone will smoke it. In fact, it ruins nearby high THC varieties through cross pollination.
For an excellent overview, seethis article, which includes an answer to the question posed by the OP:
IME the push for “hemp” with all its wonderful industrial uses has been largely replaced by the push for medical marijuana with all its wonderful medical uses. As well as a fair amount of push for “just legalize the stuff - people should be able to get high if they want it, and it isn’t as bad as most other ways to get blasted”.
If pot does get completely legalized, which it should, I very much doubt the use of industrial hemp is going to skyrocket. Medical uses might increase, but not by prescription - it is not particularly useful in medicine, apart from some specialized niches.
Jack Herer’s book promoted a lot of this stuff, called “The Emperor Wears No Clothes: Hemp and the Marijuana Conspiracy.” Willie Nelson, Woody Harrelson, and other celibrities are a big fan of that book. It’s been out for decades, makes a case for marijuana legalization, and says that plant can help save the planet with the various products that can be made out of it.
Thought it interesting, but was way too rosy of a picture of what the plant could really do for the planet. I have the older one that is green and white on its cover, a newer version is out. The book is entertaining, it gets some things right, it finally had the US government admit that they did have a film out promoting hemp, after years of denying such a film existed. Other parts of the book are total nonsense. Also could have used better citations. I’m sure scholars would be harsh about a good portion of the history it portrays. However, it wouldn’t suprise me if this book did inspire enough voters to help get marijuana legalized in many states. Just about any marijuana proponet is familiar with it.
Pilot programs to grow and sell industrial hemp to test the market were quietly legalized at the Federal level back in 2014, though still fairly tightly controlled. A number of states have started industrial hemp pilot programs under that legislation, and they’re starting to actually grow crops, so there should be much more solid information on the market for industrial hemp products in the next few years. One of the issues with industrial hemp has been the chicken vs egg problem that you can’t get good data about how big the market is/how useful it is if you forbid the market entirely, but no one wanted to loosen any laws without knowing that there is a market to justify the effort, which should now be resolved.
Hemp for the programs has to have a low THC content, and generally the states doing such programs have laws or procedures set up to test the plants and destroy them if they’re too high in THC.
It is just really, really shitty Cannabis Sativa, not a separate species of pot. When you grow it for hemp it is planted close together so you get tall plants with long fibers. Just broadcast seeding works well, grows like a weed. Then a few male plants, like one or two out of ten, can pollinate the larger population of females and you get a lot of seeds, which is something that you do not want if you are growing for, ah “medicinal” reasons.
The seeds are rich in oil and often used for bird feed. But how much bird food do we need? How much hemp oil and what is its application that can’t be filled by something like canola? The fibers make great rope, can be used for paper and clothing, so it does have many uses. Do we need them?
But as I sit here at my desk looking out at the millions of trees growing in this wet green corner of Oregon I question the need for a new fiber source for paper. And the trees in the Coast Range are growing on hills that really have no other application or use other than recreation. So should we devote prime agricultural acreage to the production of hemp? Why?
Disclaimer: I am an avid, and very good, gardener of the potent and legal, “recreational” kind of pot. And all of the bills in my household are paid for from the manufacture of toilet paper. So I have some bias. But I just don’t see industrial hemp as really the answer to anything. It is an answer awaiting the question. And I agree that industrial hemp was always a back door for legal pot cultivation.
Not that there is anything wrong with that. But let’s be honest.
Need? We probably don’t need flax, but we have it. Hemp seed has many uses, from soap to non-dairy cheese. Hemp fiber is used in automobile parts, and has promise for medical filters. Hemp paper is very durable and used by some countries for paper currency. It’s all specialized and limited at this point, but it’s a good crop that has been unfairly maligned (and unjustly deified).
Is there any truth to the opinion that recreational & industrial hemp can’t be grown too close to each other, or they’ll cross-pollinate, resulting in industrial hemp that isn’t strong enough to make anything out of it and recreational hemp that tastes like shit?
Generally speaking and only in places where it is legal to do so, we wouldn’t want our recreational hemp pollinated at all … the female flowers will continue to grow when they’re not pollinated thus producing bigger “buds” … once these female flowers receive pollen, they stop growing, set seed and die … marijuana is an annual plant …
I’ve never thought that recreational pot tasted or was any less potent if it did get pollinated by industrial hemp (aka ditch-weed) … but the seeds that are produced are worthless for replanting, the hemp grown from these seeds tastes like shit and only gives you a headache …
There’s been some other movement this month that probably speeds gathering new data on how valuable a crop it could be. The Omnibus Budget Bill of 2018 included language that specifically allowed interstate and international shipping of hemp products. A bigger piece of news, that I thought inspired the central question of the thread, was an announcement about new legislation to be introduced next week. One of our “long haired, pothead hippies” in Congress plans to introduce The Hemp Farming Act of 2018. The bill would remove hemp from the federal list of controlled substances. The hippie in question is Senate Majority Leader McConnell.
Kentucky was the heart of the “Hemp Belt” back in the day. It makes sense. It’s where Woody got arrested for planting hemp, and ateacher got fired for talking about it.
When it’s growing, how distinguishable is hemp from marijuana? I’ve heard it said that part of the reason for hemp’s illegality was that it made it too easy to camouflage a large-scale marijuana operation, but I’ve always thought that had an air of urban legend to it.
Dallas Jones and Dr. Nahas are saying the same thing. Different varieties of a plant are not considered different species. Probably the most famous and extreme example is that cauliflower, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, and a shitton of other cabbage-like vegetables are all varieties of the same species, Brassica oleracea.