HEMP SOLUTION TO POLLUTION

One way we can reduce greenhouse gases (NOW, December 8-14) that no one
seems willing to discuss is to grow lots of hemp.

Hemp has over 25,000 industrial applications. The plant filters both the
air and the soil as it grows, it needs none of the chemical fertilizers and
pesticides of most other crops, and will grow on even marginal land.

We could make cheap ethanol fuel for cars from hemp, and throw
clean-burning dried hemp into our coal-fired power plants. We could save
trees by printing our newspapers on hemp, and use non-toxic, biodegradable
hemp polymers to replace all our plastic needs.

But that would be stiff competition for Big Oil and Big Corn, who have a
lot of stroke with our government, so it's no wonder we aren't doing it.

Russell Barth, Ottawa