SENATE VOTES TO OK STUDY OF INDUSTRIAL HEMP

FRANKFORT - The tall, skinny hemp plant, a cousin to marijuana that is used
to produce a wide variety of products, is poised to return to Kentucky soil.

The Senate voted 26-11 yesterday for House Bill 100, which would permit
Kentucky's college agricultural programs to grow industrial hemp and study
its potential value as a crop. Depending on the results of those studies,
hemp could return to private farms and offer an alternative for beleaguered
tobacco farmers, supporters said.

So far, no college has expressed an interest in growing hemp, but that
could change if the bill becomes law, said George Graves, spokesman for the
Council on Postsecondary Education.

Federal and state drug laws passed a half-century ago linked hemp and
marijuana and prohibited the growth of either plant. Currently, only Hawaii
grows hemp for academic research, but more than a dozen other states have
considered similar legislation.

House Bill 100 will go to a House-Senate conference committee for minor
revisions before it goes to Gov. Paul Patton, who will sign it into law, a
spokesman said.

Yesterday's vote was a hard-fought victory for hemp advocates, who lobbied
for similar bills without success in recent years. They won this year after
convincing the Kentucky State Police and the governor that the academic
study of hemp would not serve as a cover for marijuana production.

"There's a lot of misinformation out there," said Sen. Joey Pendleton,
D-Hopkinsville. "This is only a study of industrial hemp."

Some Senate Republicans were skeptical, attributing much of the bill's
support to the "marijuana subculture." Groups that favor marijuana
legalization hope hemp production will make it more difficult to enforce
drug laws, and maybe even weaken the public's opposition to marijuana, they
said.

Industrial hemp and marijuana are separate subspecies of Cannabis sativa L.
Marijuana has from five to 20 times the level of tetrahydrocannabinol, or
THC, a mind-altering substance that can relax users when ingested.

But the two plants appear similar enough that hemp fields could camouflage
marijuana, critics said. And even a trace of THC from hemp food products
would show up as marijuana in drug tests, rendering urine tests useless,
they added.

"Legalizing hemp is legalizing marijuana. It's a stepping stone," said Sen.
Vernie McGaha, R-Russell Springs.

House Bill 100 sets strict and potentially expensive rules for hemp growth.
Colleges would apply to the Council on Postsecondary Education for the
right to participate. In exchange, colleges must agree to obey federal
laws, which call for fences and guards to monitor any property where hemp
is grown. They also must notify local and state police about the size and
location of their hemp crops.

Additionally, the bill creates a 17-member Kentucky Industrial Hemp
Commission to report to the governor and legislators on the progress of
hemp research.

It's not known how many of the state's colleges would apply to grow hemp.
Kentucky State University in Frankfort might participate if the cost and
space demands are not burdensome, and if qualified researchers are
available on staff, said Harold Benson, director of the school's land-grant
agricultural program.

"It would be something we would consider," Benson said. "It would not
necessarily be placed at the forefront of our agricultural research farm."

A 1998 study by the University of Kentucky found that hemp could be a
profitable crop for Kentucky. Various industries could support the
cultivation of 82,000 acres of hemp in the United States, with a profit of
$220 to $605 per acre, according to the study, which was sponsored by the
Kentucky Hemp Museum and Library.

"There certainly is a market there. Whether there is enough of a market for
20 states to do it, I don't know, so it seems important for Kentucky to get
in on the front end," said UK economist Mark Berger, co-author of the study.

Hemp grown in other countries is used in many products, including paper,
rope, clothing, food and automobile parts. Prior to the laws that
prohibited its production, Kentucky was the nation's leading hemp producer.
Among the local landmarks depicting the hemp plant is the Bourbon County
courthouse dome.

"We've got a large part of our populace who either remember growing hemp or
remember their fathers growing hemp," said Andy Graves, president of the
Kentucky Hemp Growers Cooperative.

News researcher Linda Minch contributed to this report.