Give hemp a chance

April 15, 1992
Issue 

Dr Andrew Katelaris

Give hemp a chance

The first European Conference on Industrial Crops was held in Maastricht, the Netherlands, in November. One of the main items discussed was the Dutch government's hemp project. This is investigating the potential for developing an ecologically benign and long-term sustainable non-wood paper industry using Indian hemp, Cannabis sativa, as the principal feedstock.

The Dutch government has committed itself to reducing the use of toxic chemicals and providing farmers with additional sources of income. It has identified cannabis as the crop most likely to achieve these objectives, by providing a rotation crop to reduce the soil load of plant pests, and paper as the most likely profitable product.

The United Nations Single Convention on Drug Use specifically exempts the industrial cultivation of cannabis from prohibition. In France 8000 hectares are cultivated annually. In the Ukraine annual production is over 60,000 hectares, used mostly for heavy duty fabrics, though research is now being directed to paper products. Fabric manufactured from 100% hemp fibre is available on the world market. The cloth is of a high quality and rivals the best linens produced from flax or cotton. The yield per hectare exceeds cotton by 300%.

In 1990 a study was commissioned by the state minister for energy into the prospects of developing ethanol production in NSW to supply environmentally safer vehicle fuels. The addition of 10% aqueous alcohol to petrol in an internal combustion engine can eliminate the need for lead additives while improving the efficiency of the engine and reducing levels of non-lead emissions.

The key areas identified were recommendations to reduce production costs by identifying new, high yielding ligno-cellulosic crops. A key feature was selection of crops that would yield secondary harvests to enhance the economic viability of the project. In northern NSW cannabis could easily yield 20 tonnes per hectare of dry stem material annually, being exceptionally rich in cellulose, while top cutting of the leaf crown and seed heads would supply a high value stock feedcake and oil source.

Hemp seed oil has been used for millennia as food, both human and animal, by many cultures. According to United States Department of Agriculture documentation, the early settlers of that country depended on cannabis to provide many of their essential needs, including the heavy canvas used on covered wagons, clothing such as the original Levi jeans, food, medicine and oil for lighting, paints, lacquers and varnishes. Most of the paper from last century, especially archival and high quality book paper, was fashioned from cannabis fibre.

Historical and current agronomic data indicate that cannabis cultivation has many advantages. It is a hardy and adaptable crop able to accommodate to a range of growing situations. Cannabis, when sown densely, as is the practice in fibre production, acts as an efficient otations can clear a field of weeds, leaving the ground improved for subsequent crops. This, along with a deep and vigorous tap root which remains in the soil after harvest, will actually improve soil structure in long-term cultivation.

The country would benefit by the introduction of a paper pulp industry employing thousands of people more than from capital-intensive Kraft mills — and without the insidious accumulation of dioxin and other, as yet not even categorised, organochlorides.

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