Editorial: Washington farmers will profit from hemp crops

If George Washington were farming today, he would be busted.

One of the crops our first president grew on his Virginia estate was hemp, which was widely cultivated for its use in rope-making and other industrial products. Drafts of the U.S. Constitution were written on hemp. Henry Ford once made an automobile body from hemp.

But hemp was a victim of reefer madness. Swept up in anti-marijuana hysteria, hemp’s cultivation was banned even though it has negligible quantities of tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, which provides the high in marijuana. Despite that important difference, federal and state authorities have never bothered to make the distinction in law, so what was once a valuable crop has been denied American farmers.

The United States has become the No. 1 importer of hemp products. Now, that’s madness.

But the laws are finally changing.

The 2014 Farm Bill allows colleges and universities to grow hemp for research purposes, but only in states that have legalized industrial hemp farming.

The Washington Senate responded by unanimously passing Senate Bill 3012, which authorizes the growth and possession of industrial hemp, and authorizes Washington State University to study the feasibility of developing a commercial hemp industry. Secondarily, it would study how best to prevent cross-pollination of hemp by marijuana, possibly increasing its THC.

Restricting marijuana growing to greenhouses is the simple answer. Tight regulation is another, and the more detailed and comprehensive House bill, HB 1552, which is sponsored by Rep. Matt Shea, R-Spokane Valley, would require farmers to be licensed and pay an initial $10-per-acre fee to cover oversight costs. Expensive, but the potential payoff is significant.

The Hemp Industries Association estimates the value of hemp-based products sold in the United States exceeds $600 million. In addition to its use as fiber in clothes, auto parts and building materials – ever heard of hemp-crete? – oils derived from hemp seed are praised for their benefits in food and health care products.

On the frontiers of technology, the American Association of Mechanical Engineers reports hemp nano-fibers could be critical to the development of inexpensive supercapacitors that may revolutionize electricity storage.

One witness told the House Committee on Commerce and Gaming that she gets inquiries about her beauty products from as far away as Japan, but has to source the raw material she uses from Canada.

That money could be going to Washington farmers, she said. In fact, Washington was one of the biggest, if not the biggest shipper of hemp before it was carelessly classified as a drug.

Several other states have already seized the opportunity created by the Farm Bill to put hemp back into American soil, which, not incidentally, benefits from the crop’s ability to absorb pollution, including radioactive debris. This is a natural for Washington, and perhaps the final step toward rationalizing the production and use of all hemp/marijuana after decades of counterproductive bans.