Sorry, jbe, I see the usual "substantial facts" crowd has taken off and run with this one. Hemp used to be grown as a crop for fiber in the U.S. I haven't followed the issue closely, it's clearly a political non-starter in the current climate.
The hemp/marijuana "connection" is quite silly, of course. My understanding of what's happened with marijuana is that the War on Some Drugs pressure on growers has resulted in the crop going indoors, undercover, with a big incentive for quality over quantity. Now recreational marijuana is incredibly potent compared to the old weed. I don't know the precise figures, but people get 20% or so THC content in "buds" now, and they don't bother with the leaves at all. "Ditch weed", what grows wild, is laughed at. I imagine the idea of smoking a commercial crop of hemp would be about as appealing as smoking manilla rope or binder twine. "Gateway", indeed.
Hemp is supposed to be great for biomass conversion, and you'd think we could at least allow research for stuff like sequestering CO2. But near as I can tell, there's no paper shortage on the horizon, for recycling purposes paper is back in the "pay to have it hauled away" category again. If making paper from hemp becomes an industry, it's not going to be lead from the U.S.
Cheers, Dan. |
