What The Heck Is All The Hype About Hemp

A person who studies or works with hemp might be inclined to say that hemp is a gift from Nature to us Humans. This article describes briefly what hemp has contributed to the development of society throughout the ages, how it was lost to religious based prohibition, and how hemp is coming back into the limelight to curb our toxic relience on petroleum products and help to establish a road back to sustainable societies, a road which we dramatically abandoned a mear 80 years ago.

hemp history, hemp prohibition, hemp vs mrijuana,

What the Heck is all this Hype 
about Hemp?

 

 

Brief Hemp History

Hemp and marijuana are derived from the same plant Cannabis sativa L., which is a weed, but a truly amazing weed, indeed! What makes cannabis so amazing? Well it's Mother Natures most useful plant for us humans. In ancient times, and when we say ancient we mean 8000BCE in Eurasia, hemp was instrumental in the development of early civilization and the science of farming and selective breeding. Hemp & Sky

Consequently people across the Eurasian continent ate hemp, wore hemp, slept on hemp, medicated with hemp, then mixed hemp fiber with clay to make strong huts, ovens, and pottery; then to make rope, clothing, canvas tarps and sails and eventually even paper.....and eventually they used the cannabis/hemp flower resin for medicinal purposes and spiritual practices. 

While cannabis/hemp is not native to the Americas, it came over early in the 16th century with Spanish explorers and quickly spread throughout colonial European settlements where cannabis/hemp became a staple crop and source material for food, oil, and fiber to make many products such as hemp flower for medicinal pharmacopeia; hemp fiber for rope, tarps, sails, clothing, paper; hemp seeds for food & feed; land hemp oil for skin care, varnish and paint, , etc..    

Prohibition

In 1937 the Marijuana Tax Act took effect in the USA, and with that Act in hand, the false accusations by the religious anti-hemp lobby won the day and hemp prohibition took effect. Subsequently all "hemp" products were systematically removed from shelves. Notice that it was the "Marijuana" Tax Act, and not the "Hemp" Tax Act. Had the word "Hemp" been included, an entire industry with thousands of workers, from the farmers to the processors, and local manufacturers of the hundreds of hemp products, would have lobbied against the proposed act.  
 
History, Kentucky Hemp HarvestBefore WWII, hemp had been farmed in the USA since 1611, being used exclusively throughout North America for rope, canvas and burlap, but no one had even heard of "marijuana". Marijuana was a completely new word for a different form of Cannabis containing THC. No one knew that hemp and marijuana were from the same root plant, Cannabis sativa
 
While hemp and marijuana are cousins, derived from the plant (Cannabis sativa) they are functionally completely different in that cannabis/marijuana contains the narcotic THC - tetrahydrocannabinol that gets you stoned and cannabis/hemp contains CBD, which does not get you stoned, plus it's fiber and seeds are used industrially for all the above mentioned products. 
 
But in the late 30's there were new industries being born, such as oil and gas and petrochemicals, wood pulp for paper, and the cotton industry was taking over the textiles industry. The hemp industry was a direct competitor for each of these new emerging industries, which all required public funding to get established. At the same time hemp was gaining more attention as new products and hemp technology was improving with the invention of the hemp decorticator. 
 
So, as the conspiracy goes, the lobby from the purveyors of the new industries was looking for a way to get rid of competition by the hemp industry so they could move forward with all their new synthetic products made from petroleum, cotton and wood pulp. But how could this be done since hemp was the #1 source material for manufacturing and the economy relied on the production of hemp products. Enter the cousin of hemp......marijuana, which becomes a smoke screen for the industrialist lobbying against the hemp industry. 
 
While hemp had a long history in North America, marijuana was unknown. Marijuana was the Spanish name for Cannabis containing THC used for the mild narcotic effect of making a person feel slightly intoxicated. Marijuana entered the USA around 1910 into the southern border states after the Mexican Revolution. People in Jazz Clubs and Honky Tonks began smoking marijuana for it's narcotic effects which is know to accentuate the experience of playing and listening to music. Not surprisingly, the church was concerned about this new form of intoxication affecting their youth who were really just having a great time at a music club. 
 
Reefer MadnessSo, the most outrageous and environmentally costly scandal in the world began by a few powerfulReefer Madness 2 industrialists who had everything to gain and nothing to lose by eliminating industrial hemp. With the entirely false accusations about marijuana, they produced the laughable propaganda film called "Reefer Madness" that convinced everyone in ignorance that marijuana was evil. They used the power of the church lobby against marijuana, to convinced the Federal Government to Tax "all cannabis products", including all hemp products, out of production.
 
Then, one by one, all western countries in Europe and America followed suit and removed hemp products from shelves and shut down the entire "natural" products industries and the "circular bio-economies" that existed around the world. Then, as if that was not enough, Cannabis, including hemp used to make textiles and rope, was labeled a Schedule #1 Narcotic. This effectively removed hemp products from existence for nearly a century and kicked off the equally ludicrous "War On Drugs".  
 
With hemp's natural bio-fiber industry out of the way, the Western World went from local production, circular bio-economies, to a petroleum based,  global economy based on synthetic products which, in less than 100 years, are directly responsible for our climate, mass extinction and plastic pollution crisis.  

Hemp VS Marijuana

The difference between cannabis-hemp and cannabis-marijuana is simply the difference in the selective breeding of cannabis over 1000's of years where hemp was breed for it's fiber and seed production, and marijuana was breed for it's narcotic flowers effects. The early cultivation of hemp and the selective breeding processes that followed were among the first forms of human science. As the cultivation and breeding improved, so did the prospects for organized civilization and ancient cities, as opposed to nomadic tribal movements across the land. 

Man's Best Friend

Hemp Uses DiagramYou could say that cannabis is man's-best-friend. Ok, while dogs are indeed incredibly faithful, cannabis has been providing humans with the basic necessities of life for 1000's of years. In parts of Asia, where hemp is native, hemp use dates back to pre-civilization where nomadic tribes on the Eurasian steeps traded hemp for other commodities, which led to the beginning of the silk road, the ancient trade routes running the breadth and width of the European continent.

Cannabis, both hemp and marijuana, was one of the fundamental commodities that began human trade and agricultural practices that led to the formation of human civilization.

Hemp Today

Thank goodness....."Prohibition is Over"! Hemp is as useful to us humans today as it has been for 1000's of years.....and some could argue, even more useful as humanity struggles with the climate and plastic pollution crisis brought to us by 75 years of oil and gas economic domination.

Today Hemp is back in production across Europe and North America and local industries are beginning to pop up once again. However, building a new industry from scratch is no small undertaking 

fiber still provides strong rope, warm clothing, hempcrete for home construction, a binder for concrete, canvas for tarps; hemp seeds provide an abundant super-food being one of the most nutritious food sources for humans; hemp seed oil provides omega nutrition, is amazing for skin care, is a powerful wood preservative and a natural base for paint; cannabis-hemp flower resin, such as CBD, is a powerful medicinal remedy for many human illnesses and diseases, and cannabis-marijuana is also a medicinal remedy and is still used by many people for spiritual and non-addictive recreational narcotics. 

There are four raw constituent parts to hemp and all four parts have great economic value by producing different types of highly valued, eco-friendly products:

1. Hempfiber - rope, twine, clothing, tarps, insulation, wall panels, walls, bio-fiber glass, bio-fiber plastic, canvas tarps, shoes, acoustic panels, ceiling panels, bio-fuel and much more. 

2. Hempseed - nutritional food  products, pure protein, omegas, digestive fiber and minerals, skin care, soap, wood varnish, paint, bio-diesel. 

3. Hempcbd resin - Medicinal cannabinoids, CBG, CBD, CBN, CBC terpenes & flavonoids. 

4. Hemproot - soil rebuilder storing tons of carbon in the soil; medicinal compounds.

From these four raw constituent parts, there is a world of earth-friendly products, which are good for people and amazing for the planet. All hemp products are either carbon-neutral or carbon negative, which means that they don't cause climate change, and many products, like hempcrete and hemp panels, store carbon and aid in the battle against climate change by removing carbon from the atmosphere.    

Conclusion

Hemp can produce 1000's of safe, green, earth-friendly and biodegradable products. There is just to many to list; and new research and technology are adding new hemp bio-products to the list every day. 

These are all products that cause no environmental damage, products that you can feel good about using, and good about tossing in the compost; not the waste/pollution bin. 

Hemp also regenerates depleted soil, stores tones and tones of carbon, can remove toxic heavy metals from soil, has amazing health and skin beneficial properties that are not toxic and contains no GMO. 

In fact, one could say that hemp prohibition of the last 75 years is a major cause of our present global crisis. Hemp is one of the most practical,  solutions. 

While we can never get away from many specialized plastic products, we have to get back to bio-products for most of our everyday stuff and only use plastic for specialty products that can't be produced by hemp. Then we must recall all plastic that is produced and not allow it to get into the environment.   

Hemp is essential in recreating the sustainable societies of the past. There is simply no other natural alternative to everything created by plastic. While plastic is the most practical and cheapest industrial source material for making anything, it is simply not sustainable. So, if we can make a product out of hemp that is recyclable and compostable, then we must do so.