EU CONCERNED OVER HEMP AID AND MARIJUANA LINK

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Union may cut aid to hemp growers amid
concern that public money is being used to legitimize the cultivation of
marijuana, EU sources said Tuesday.

The European Union has become concerned that controls over industrial hemp
farming, the responsibility of national authorities, are insufficient and
have allowed EU subsidies to go to illegal marijuana plantations.

``We are looking at the question of controls, and whether member states are
carrying out sufficient checks,'' said Gerry Kiely, spokesman for European
Farm Commissioner Franz Fischler.

Industrial hemp, the similar-looking but less potent cousin of marijuana, is
used to make paper, rope and canvas. It is grown mostly in France, Spain,
Britain and the Netherlands.

Kiely said the area devoted to hemp production in the EU had mushroomed in
recent years -- from around 22,200 acres in 1995-96 to some 86,500 to almost
100,000 acres in the 1998-99 season.

``With such an expansion in the area, we have to look at whether we need to
be subsidising this at all,'' one source said.

Others said there was concern the hefty rise in the area may not always have
been translated into a corresponding rise in the production of legal goods.

``So far there's no proof, but there is a suspicion that not all the
increase has been used for paper and rope,'' one said.

It is not so much the level of aid that has attracted the marijuana growers,
but in registering for EU hemp subsidies, they could legitimise their
business, sources said.