MARIJUANA CITED AS MAJOR STATE CROP

Study Calls Plant 'Untapped Source Of Revenue'

Kansas is the land of wheat, sorghum and ... weed?

A new study that's raising eyebrows around the country suggests that
the nation's top cash crop isn't corn or wheat, but marijuana. The
report, published in the "Bulletin of Cannabis Reform," puts the
value of the nation's marijuana crop at $35.8 billion, compared with
$23.3 billion for the nation's corn crop and $7.4 billion for wheat.

The study, by Virginia-based consultant Jon B. Gettman, found Kansas
to be 31st among the states in marijuana production, with a crop
value estimated at $64 million.

By comparison, Kansas' wheat crop was worth $1.25 billion in 2005,
and its grain-sorghum crop was valued at $317 million.

California was the No. 1 state listed for marijuana production, with
a crop estimated at $13.8 billion.

The study began with a federal estimate that there are 10,000 metric
tons of marijuana produced nationwide, multiplied it by a value of
$1,606 per pound, and apportioned it to states based on the average
seizures of cultivated marijuana plants through a federal
marijuana-eradication program from 2003 to 2005.

The study describes marijuana as an "untapped source of revenue" for
states that could potentially be regulated. Gettman wrote that in the
past two decades, a federal marijuana-eradication program "has been
unable to curtail the growth of domestic cultivation in the United
States, let alone make any progress toward suppressing, abolishing or
eliminating this market phenomenon."

Kansas receives a federal grant of about $230,000 per year for its
marijuana eradication program, said Kyle Smith, deputy director of
the Kansas Bureau of Investigation. By far, the majority of the
plants seized in Kansas are untended, wild-growing plants without
high levels of the active ingredient in marijuana, THC.

For example, in 2005, there were 1.18 million wild marijuana plants
eradicated in Kansas, compared with 3,690 cultivated plants.

The wild-growing plants, commonly known as "ditchweed," were not
included in Gettman's study.

Smith, the KBI spokesman, was skeptical of the study, which was
touted in a nationwide press release by the Washington, D.C.-based
Marijuana Policy Project.

"It's kind of a publicity stunt. I can't really blame them," Smith
said. "They have an agenda, and they're pushing it."

He said he thinks advocates for marijuana reform are a vocal
minority, and that if the nation truly wanted to change the laws
related to the drug, it could have elected leaders by now to do so.

Bob Eye, a Lawrence-based attorney and a founding board member of the
reform-minded Drug Policy Forum of Kansas, said he views the study as
evidence the war on drugs is not working.

"It's pretty clear that the efforts by law enforcement to essentially
eliminate marijuana-growing have been a failure, and on the other
hand what has been a success is the capacity of growers to hone their
craft and essentially make it a part of the economy," he said.

"The fact that any activity generates $35 billion worth of
transactions bears very close study, and I think it also reflects the
relative acceptance of marijuana in the culture."

Said Smith, "Just because a lot of people want it doesn't make it right."