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Canada’s Narrowing Hemp Industry Advantage
July 23rd, 2015 – Canada’s North American market leadership in hemp production is at risk. While commercial hemp production in Canada began in 1998 and Canada currently grows approximately 100,000 acres annually, competition from the U.S. is quickly emerging a hemp researcher warns. “This year is a year of change,” says Jan Slaski, a senior…
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Colorado: Feds Allow Hemp Seed Imports
May 12, 2015 – Following months of wrangling, the Colorado Department of Agriculture has secured a permit from federal drug enforcement officials to import industrial hemp seed from foreign countries. The seeds are essential to kick-start Colorado’s hemp industry, which state agriculture officials say has seen a bottleneck in research and cultivation due to a…
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Kentucky Hemp Industry Brings Economic Renewal
May 8th, 2015 – Kentucky’s hemp crop is growing and attracting new investors to the state, according to Agriculture Commissioner James Comer. At a news conference Tuesday in Lexington, Comer announced that 121 participants have been selected to grow hemp this year, including seven universities across the state. There are 36 groups and projects that…
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Certified Organic Cannabis – Do Consumers Care?
April 28, 2015 – While a growing number of consumers and growers appreciate the concept of organically-produced cannabis, right now the legal industry occupies a gray area when it comes to verification. Technically, the cannabis industry can’t lay claim to the organic label. That requires certification by the US Department of Agriculture, a federal agency,…
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Is Hemp Biomass a Viable Bio-Coal?
April 15th, 2015 – A Georgia-based company is testing hemp as an alternative feedstock to timber-based wood chips for conversion into bio-coal. Vega Biofuels Inc. specializes in converting organic materials such as woodchips into bio-fuels for energy production and biochar for the hemp and medical marijuana growing industries. To date, most coal-fired plants converted to…
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Hawaii Hemp Research Station to Study Industrial Hemp
April 14th, 2015 – Hawaii made hemp history last Friday, joining only a handful of other states in the nation to do research on hemp, set in Waimanalo. Lawmakers, farmers and University of Hawaii officials planted the first hemp seed at the UH Waimanalo Research Station. UH will study how industrialized hemp works as part…
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Are Hemp Processing Bio-Refineries Key to a Thriving Hemp Industry?
April 9th, 2015 – Whether we are talking about plastics, clothing, medicine, cuisine or construction, the forms and uses of hemp are exponentially expanding. Hemp, once a previously outlawed plant in America is becoming a legitimate crop where serious investments are being made in the states where it is legal. However one crucial requirement for…
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Is Canada’s Medical Cannabis Market Becoming an Oligopoly?
March 23rd, 2015 – Growing scientific consensus on cannabis’ medicinal value has sparked the attention of leading players in Canada’s traditional pharmaceutical industry. As Canadians increase their consumption of medicinal cannabis, former pharmaceutical executives are jumping on the bandwagon. As Greg Engel, CEO for Tilray said recently in an online essay for the Huffington Post, “We are…
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The Kentucky Cloth Project – a New Hemp-Wool-Alpaca Textile
March 16th, 2015 – Now that Kentucky can grow hemp again, the next step is figuring out what to do with it. A new project, a cooperative effort among local producers, the Kentucky Department of Agriculture and a California non-profit called Fibershed, has a possible answer with its plan to blend hemp with wool and alpaca fiber,…
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Canada: Organic Hemp Supply Can’t Meet Demand
February 27th, 2015 – The opportunities are big these days for the growers of organic hemp, says the executive director of Organic Alberta. “We are seeing very strong growth in the organic sector with 58 per cent of Canadians buying organic on a weekly basis,” said Becky Lipton. “Organic hemp is right up there as one…