LAWMAKERS EXPLORE HEMP'S POTENTIAL AS CASH CROP

South Dakota lawmakers will discuss this week whether industrial hemp is a
potentially lucrative value-added crop for farmers or a headache for law
enforcement.

The House Agriculture Committee takes up a proposal Tuesday that could open
the door to hemp production in South Dakota.

Supporters say hemp is the honest but misunderstood cousin of the illegal
drug marijuana. The plant produces oil, seeds and a fiber that can be used
to make clothing and other products.

"This is an amazing plant and there's an amazing amount of stuff coming
down the pike with this," said Watertown-area dairy farmer Joe Stein. "It's
a value-added crop."

There is one significant difference between hemp and marijuana, supporters
say. Hemp doesn't pack enough of the chemical substance
tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC, to get someone high. Both plants are
varieties of the same species, Cannabis sativa, which is a controlled
substance in the United States regardless of its narcotic content.

House Bill 1267 sanctions production of industrial hemp with a THC content
of 1 percent or less. The bill adds that anyone harvesting, possessing or
selling industrial hemp with a THC content greater than that is guilty of a
Class 2 misdemeanor, although no violation will be prosecuted unless THC
content is greater than 3 percent.

But even as Rep. Robert Weber, R-Strandburg, introduced the bill last week,
a recent report from U.S. Department of Agriculture's Economic Research
Service was downplaying hemp as a new crop for farmers, saying it's likely
to remain a "small, thin market."

The report pointed out that in Canada, where industrial hemp is legal, the
35,000 acres grown in 1999 oversupplied the North American market.

The report adds that hemp oil has poor prospects because it has a short
shelf life and can't be used for frying; that the hemp seed market is
likely to remain small like the market for sesame and poppy seeds; and that
the textile market for hemp fiber, judging by the textile demand for linen
derived from the legal crop, flax, is not likely to be profitable.

But Bob Newland of Hermosa -- a member of the Libertarian Party who has
been pushing the issue with a series of postcards to state lawmakers in
recent months -- counters that the market will develop if industrial hemp
is legalized.

Weber said the bill seems to have a good many supporters in the House, and
added that the real effect of the legislation would be to send a message to
Washington to change federal policies on hemp.

"We're trying to get the federal government to back off and let us raise it
like they do in Canada and some other places," he said.

Nineteen other states have considered hemp legislation since 1995 and
several have approved it. Minnesota and North Dakota allow production if
farmers obtain permits from the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency.

But law enforcement officers see some problems with the legislation -- one
of them the fact that industrial hemp and marijuana look alike.

"It sounds like an enforcement nightmare," said Lt. Mark Moberly of the
narcotics section of the Sioux Falls Police Department. "How would you
separate the hemp growers from the people who are growing marijuana for
recreational use? The alleged difference is the THC level, which you cannot
see with the naked eye."

Moberly adds that the issue becomes more complicated because proponents of
legalizing marijuana frequently piggy-back on the issue of legalizing
industrial hemp. In South Dakota there's at least some basis to what
Moberly says.

Newland is president of the Mt. Rushmore State Chapter of the National
Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws -- which is one reason he
probably won't be testifying for the hemp bill in Pierre.

"As a matter of fact, they have told me to stay home," Newland said. "The
prime sponsor did say that I should not testify in favor of the bill
because they (lawmakers) connect me with drug legalization."

Stein, the Watertown farmer, finds hemp's kinship with marijuana
unfortunate. "Hemp compared to marijuana is like comparing a Chihuahua with
a pit bull. They're both dogs, but they're very different kinds of dogs."