Pubdate: Wed, 07 Sep 2005
Source: 100 Mile House Free Press (CN BC)
Copyright: 2005 100 Mile House Free Press
Contact:  http://www.100milefreepress.net/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2143
Author: Lachlan Labere
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?330 (Hemp - Outside U.S.)

COULD HEMP SUSTAIN THE CARIBOO

Jack Witty's dream is to see the South Cariboo bloom from a plant that's 
rich with potential yet rife with misunderstanding.

For the past five years the 108 Mile resident has been researching the 
feasibility of growing and processing industrial hemp in and around 100 
Mile. Over that time the 72-year-old retired economic development 
specialist has amassed a four-inch thick folder. Its contents include 
features from established Canadian magazines, European scientific studies, 
socio-political backgrounders and comprehensive analyses undertaken by the 
governments of Canada and B.C., all of which focus on the much-maligned plant.

"The environment is perfect for it. In our climate you would grow about one 
crop a year," Witty said.

There are over 25,000 products that can be made from the oils and fibre 
derived from industrial hemp. Attained from hemp seeds, the oils can be 
used in a wide-range of medicines and food products. In Manitoba the plant 
is even being explored as a source of ethanol.

Prior to hemp being outlawed in North America in 1930, the fibres were 
commonly used in textiles, rope and paper. Today the resilient fibre is 
being experimented for construction materials. Washington State University 
found that fibreboard produced with hemp to be twice as strong as its 
wood-based equivalent. Hemp fibre is being used by car manufacturers in 
Europe and the U.S. for such things as car panels.

And in Europe and Australia hemp has been used to create lighter yet 
stronger bricks used for housing and other construction applications "What 
we do need, and need to find somewhere, is an entrepreneur who would be 
prepared to look at it from a manufacturing point of view," he said. "Give 
us a manufacturer, and the growing will happen.

That said, Witty recognized that technologies are not where they need to be 
in North America for hemp to become a viable business of scale, 
particularly when it comes to cultivating the fibre.

"The problem is the fibre is so tough-it was very hard on traditional 
equipment," Witty explained. "The problem in North America is we have done 
nothing up to date. We haven't manufactured in North America since 1945.

Witty noted that while European countries, particularly the UK., Holland 
and Germany, have made great strides in advancing commercial hemp 
cultivation and manufacturing technologies, similar technologies in North 
America can typically be found in museums.

Hemp was grown in the United States and Canada until the 1930s when the 
development of synthetic fibres along with improvements in technologies for 
making paper from trees led to a slump in the hemp market. Witty's theory 
is that corporate pressures lead to political pressures, which a "lead to 
Canada's Opium and Narcotics Control Act in 1938 and the outlawing of 
industrial hemp.

"The way I read the history, it was made illegal primarily because the 
product was cheaper, and interfered with some of the major industrial 
conglomerates in the U.S. and they did not want the competition from the 
plant because it's totally renewable," Witty commented.

The Canadian government did require farmers to grow industrial hemp for use 
during the Second World War, but they had to use the same technology 
developed in the 1920s.

While other countries continued to advance hemp production after the war, 
it remained illegal in the U.S. and Canada. In 1996, the Food Production 
and Inspection Branch of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada issued a 
statement suggesting that industrial hemp shouldn't carry the stigma of its 
cousin, marijuana.

"Health Canada now recognizes the difference between these two types of 
hemp but regulates who can produce a crop for fibre.

In 1996 Health Canada began issuing licences to grow industrial hemp in 
controlled test plots (the first in B.C. was issued in 1997). And in 1998 
Health Canada legalized the commercial production of industrial hemp. Witty 
noted that in the U.S. it remains illegal to grow hemp, but legal to import 
hemp products.

Eye on 100 Mile

Hemptown, a Canadian hemp clothing company may be close to tapping that 
opportunity. Seeking to become a key player in hemp manufacturing, Hemptown 
is creating an enzyme that will soften hemp stalks, allowing for the a 
"cultivation of their fibres in a time that Hemptown CEO Jerry Kroll said 
could revolutionize hemp manufacturing world over, and put Hemptown and 
Canada on the map for what Kroll refers to as "Canadian cotton.

"What currently happens is it takes 60 days to process those strings out of 
the plant because the plant has to decompose in a field and go through a 
mechanical process," Kroll explained. "The enzyme that we're working on in 
collaboration with Canada's National Research Council, we would be able to 
process those fibres and pull them out of the plant... in five hours. 
That's a staggering reduction in time and costs.

Hemptown has already partnered with the small agricultural community of 
Craik, Sask. Currently engaged in a community-wide sustainable living 
project, the community has embraced organically grown hemp as a way of the 
future. Hemptown plans on contributing to that future by building a $5 
million, 40,000 sq.-ft. hemp manufacturing mill, where the new enzyme, 
expected to be patented soon, would be put to its first large scale 
commercial use.

Kroll suggested that Craik's future could very well be 100 Mile's.

"I can't confirm that we'd be doing anything in 100 Mile House at this 
point in time, but I can confirm that it has been discussed already," Kroll 
said. "100 Mile House is an ideal area for us to see it in there. Lots of 
agricultural opportunity, cool climate, lots of rail access. It is an area 
where we can very easily see a Craik-type of situation developing, and 
having all the spin-offs, not just for the growing of the seed stock, but 
also jobs at the plant. And the key thing is the secondary industries 
coming out of that like potentially locating a spinning mill, that sort of 
thing in 100 Mile House - and the usual retail, housing, those sort of 
booms that accompany a new industry.

Liberal

B.C.'s new Agriculture and Lands Minister Pat Bell sees great potential in 
the area for hemp production, particularly as a means of mitigating the 
impact of the mountain pine beetle.

"We have all these mountain pine beetle lands that are going to be 
defoliated over the next few years here, and it makes a lot of sense to me 
to look at how we can convert some of those lands to agriculture," Bell 
said. "And I am not suggesting that you would take 10 or 15 or 20 per cent 
of the provincial forest. But to put some perspective on it, if you took 
100,00 hectares, which is a significant amount of land, and converted that 
to agriculture, that would represent about 0.2 per cent of the provincial 
annual allowable cut, so it's a relatively small portion.

Bell said his ministry is working with six B.C. First Nations groups on 
developing pilot projects around the production of industrial hemp oils. He 
also said the ministry is working with 100 Mile Mayor Donna Barnett on 
"putting a package together and moving forward.

"I did discuss that with the minister," Barnett said. "And the minister 
actually was going to get us some information on some projects elsewhere.

Bell said Witty's dream is realistic. Kroll thinks so too, sharing a 
similar dream for all of Canada.

"I see a $25 billion dollar a year industry coming to Canada," said Kroll. 
"I see vast tracks of industrial hemp being grown, and I see dozens of 
these-processing facilities receiving the industrial hemp feed stock from 
the farmers coast to coast, churning out 480 lb. bales of fluffy, white 
'Canadian cotton'.

Witty's first and foremost concern, however, has always revolved around the 
future of the community he calls home.

"I got involved because I really believe that a healthy community requires 
jobs," Witty commented. "I've lived in communities that had their income 
totally taken away from them for reasons beyond their control. So when I 
came here, I thought it would be interesting to see what kinds of things 
could be done that improve or increase rural income. And one of the things 
I came across was industrial hemp. It seemed like a no-brainer that 
something could be done with this. All the technology is available. All the 
information is available. But unless there's a market, nobody's going to 
get involved in growing. The only way to get a market is if somebody 
somewhere builds a manufacturing facility. Well, my dream would be that 
manufacturing facility should be here."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom