CLEARING THE AIR ABOUT HEMP

I was quite surprised to read the July 15 Marketplace piece, "This
Hemp Beer Is Legal, But Its Ads Hint Otherwise."

The article states, "Stalks of the hemp plant are used in rope; its
leaves and flowers produce marijuana." This is simply not true.
Industrial hemp's leaves and flowers, unlike those of marijuana,
contain negligible amounts of THC (less than 1%) and have no
psychoactive qualities. Smoking hemp would actually lead to a big
headache.

Twenty-nine nations, including Canada, England, Germany,
France and China all legally recognize hemp's non-drug.

Canadian farmers will be harvesting about 4,500 acres of hemp
fiber and seed in the coming weeks. The above countries all have
strict laws forbidding marijuana cultivation, while allowing farmers
to grow industrial hemp.

The North American Industrial Hemp Council has published a white paper,
"Hemp and Marijuana: Myths and Realities," by David P. West, Ph.D.,
which is available at www.naihc.org.

The North American Industrial Hemp Council is a coalition drawn from
industry, agriculture, academia and the environmental movement working
to reintroduce this sustainable and versatile seed and fiber crop.

The U.S.Department of Justice Drug Enforcement Administration and Gen. Barry
McCaffrey continue to state that hemp is marijuana or that hemp is
only a "novel market." The "novel marketeers" using hemp include:
Mercedes Benz, Adidas, Armani, The Body Shop and Interface Carpets.

Jeffrey W. Gain, an NAIHC board member, was recently quoted in an AP
article as saying, "I
feel the industrial hemp crop could very easily be the soybean crop of
the new millennium." Mr. Gain is a former executive director of the
American Soybean Association.

Tobacco farmers, who now see the handwriting on the wall, are
desperately looking for profitable new crops such as hemp. Farmers
also see hemp as a useful rotation crop, which chokes out weeds and
requires little if any pesticides. The University of Kentucky's Center
for Business and Economic Research just released a study which
concluded that hemp could provide farmers the second highest per-acre
income after tobacco.

Recently, several Kentucky farmers filed a suit in federal court,
challenging the U.S. government's current ban on growing hemp.
Ironically, U.S. farmers can grow an addictive drug crop, tobacco,
while growing hemp (a nondrug crop) is banned due to a flawed federal
policy. American farmers and manufacturers are thus hamstrung, while
our foreign counterparts profit by supplying hemp to a growing
marketplace. In the long run, market forces--not outdated
policies--will prevail.

Erwin A. Sholts
Chairman
North American Industrial
Hemp Council Inc.
Madison, Wisconsin

Checked-by: Rich O'Grady