VIRTUES OF HEMP WINNING OVER FANS IN FARM-MINDED IDAHO

COEUR d'ALENE, Idaho - Lynne Hutton was worried by the curly-haired man in
the suit who walked into her store and intently studied hemp products.

It wasn't the first time her hemp purses and hats, air fresheners and oils
had offended someone's sense of propriety.

Since she'd opened nearly two years earlier, Lynne had explained to several
customers the difference between industrial hemp and marijuana. Hemp isn't
a drug.

But Mike Schlepp hadn't wandered into Lynne's store to harass her.

"I was collecting information," he says. "Hemp is a crop there's a demand
for."

Mike's a farmer just like his dad. For 18 years, he and his family have
forced a living from their land along the Coeur d'Alene River near Rose
Lake. This year, they grew oats and alfalfa.

Mike's a 40-something, church-going man working hard to heal his acreage
from contamination left by a century of mining. He's the president of the
Kootenai-Shoshone chapter of the Idaho Farm Bureau.

And he's interested in hemp.

"Not necessarily to grow here," he says, gesturing toward the fields out
his window. "But it would be another alternative crop for Idaho growers to
be able to grow."

He's not alone in his interest. The Idaho Farm Bureau voted in 1996 to
"encourage the legalization of cultivation and production of industrial
grade hemp."

The farm bureau represents 11,300 farmers.

"We aren't advocating civil disobedience," the bureau's Dennis Tanikuni
says with a chuckle. "We just want to make a statement. Our folks are
pretty independent, forward thinkers. We're looked at as conservative, but
we want what works."

Idaho farms need something.

"Agriculture in Idaho is under the gun," say Pat Takasugi, the state's
director of agriculture. "We're looking for alternative crops, but we're
not ready to cross the line into the illegal."

The federal government considers hemp a controlled substance, like its
hallucinogenic cousin marijuana, and bans its cultivation. Several groups,
including the Resource Conservation Alliance, are lobbying the Drug
Enforcement Administration to legalize hemp.

The difference between the two plants is simple. Hemp contains less than 1
percent of the active ingredient, THC, which produces the high. Marijuana
plants contain 10 to 20 percent THC. Unfortunately, the two varieties look
alike.

Until the 1950s, hemp was a common crop in the United States. American
colonists were required to grow it to supply sails and ropes for ships.

The government encouraged hemp growth during World War II to supply the
military with ropes, tents and parachute cords.

But by the 1950s, taxes pushed the cost of hemp production out of sight and
the Federal Bureau of Narcotics lumped industrial hemp with marijuana,
banning the cultivation of both.

About 30 other countries still grow hemp. Canada dropped its ban on the
crop last year. Americans are allowed to manufacture hemp products, but
have to import the raw material. That bothers Mike.

"We're importing from Canada and elsewhere when American farmers could
supply the same," he says.

Ads and articles in mainstream agricultural journals sparked his interest
in hemp several years ago. Farm equipment man-ufactures showed off their
harvesters slicing through the tough plant.

At about the same time, the American Farm Bureau Federation expressed
interest in researching hemp as a crop. It wasn't long before the
organization was pegged as supporting the legal-ization of marijuana.

"That made the members uncomfortable," says David Christensen, the AFBF's
director of organization. "The next year we took any reference to hemp out
of our policy book."

Misconceptions worry Mike, too. Farming is his first concern. Hemp is a
good crop to grow in rotation with other crops, he says. It breaks weed and
disease cycles. It's a possible alternative to grass on the Rathdrum prairie.

And there's a growing market for it. Legal hemp products number in the
thousands.

"It probably would work," says farmer and state Rep. Wayne Meyer,
R-Rathdrum. "But it won't happen. I've mentioned the legalization of hemp
down here (Boise) and gotten funny looks."

Which doesn't surprise Mike. Raised eyebrows are the reason he collects his
information quietly. If the DEA ever legalizes the growth of industrial
hemp, he'll be ready to show what the plant can do for Idaho.

"Mike's one of the innovators, a doer," says Jerry Miller of the state farm
bureau. "It's not a good time to be a farmer. Farmers are diversifying out
of necessity. Mike's always looking for new ways to do things."