The Rural Voice, 1998-02, Page 21need to be beefed up to handle the
tough materials, Columbus says.
Yield can be two to four tons per acre
which sells for about $250 a ton.
The real money in hemp
production may come from
harvesting for both fibre and seed,
Columbus says. Currently seed sells
for 40-50 cents a pound and the yield
of the buckwheat -type seed is about
700 pounds per acre. After seed
harvesting, the stalks can still be used
for fibre. The difficulty is to get the
header high enough not to put too
much of the tough stalk through the
combine.
The seed is in demand for oils for
pharmaceuticals and perfume and is
also favoured as a bird feed for
racing pigeons.
Red tape is another by-product
of production, however.
Growers will need one licence
to grow hemp for fibre and a
different one for seed (authorities are
still worried about hemp's illegal
cousin). In fact, Columbus says, the
fight to get government approval for
hemp growing has been hampered by
the support given by those who saw
it as the first step in legalization of
marijuana.
"I've been to a lot of meetings
already," Columbus says, of the slow
process of working out protocols for
legalized hemp production. After one
meeting in early January was
cancelled due to the Ottawa ice
storms, another meeting of officials
from across Canada will be held
January 25-27 to set the framework
under which commercial licences
will be granted. One of the early
proposed rules, he said, was that no
one with a conviction for drug
possession would be allowed a
licence to grow hemp.
Still, Canada is a long way ahead
of the U.S. in developing hemp as a
legalized commercial crop. There,
the cotton industry has been lobbying
against this potential rival for the
plant -fibre market.
There will no doubt be headaches
but the potential is great, Columbus
says. "If this thing takes off there will
be many jobs in processing," he
predicts. Currently Canada imports
hemp from Ukraine, Hungary and
China for use in clothing. If the
industry takes off in Canada it could
also see oil extraction, fine paper
production and manufacturing into
building materials. But prices can't
be too high, he warns, because the
low labour costs in competitive
countries will put a ceiling on costs.
"We figure a farmer can net $100-
$300 an acre," he says.
The federal and Ontario
governments have invested about a
half million dollars in research so far
through programs like the tobacco
diversification fund, so much of the
research into hemp has been done in
tobacco country. Asked if hemp will
grow in areas further north,
Columbus smiled and said, "There
have been people caught growing the
other stuff (marijuana) so I imagine
you can grow it here."0
Michael J. Columbus is Alternate
Crop Specialist with OMAFRA's
Simcoe office and can be reached by
writing P.O. Box 587, Simcoe, N3Y
4N5 or calling 1-519-426-7120,
extension 314. His fax number is I-
519-428-1142 and his e-mail address
is mcolumbus@omafra.gov.on.ca
There are also two industry web sites
on the internet: www.hempline.com
and www.kenex.org
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FEBRUARY 1998 17