MISSING OUT ON AN UNTAPPED RESOURCE

The so-called war on drugs, while well-intentioned, has quite a few
unintended consequences. One of them is keeping a useful source of
fiber and oil off the market, at substantial loss to the American economy

We're talking about hemp. Because it is a relative of marijuana, it is
lumped by law into the illegal drug category. It is against the law to
grow it, although some products made from it can be imported from
other countries.

There is a movement afoot to legalize industrial hemp, a movement that
seems to be gaining momentum. Proponents trot out a laundry list of
good reasons to legalize it.

It's a profitable crop. The University of Kentucky studied the
economic benefits of growing industrial hemp and found that the hemp
industry could create 771 jobs and a worker income of $17/6 million a
year.

When the savings from using hemp to replace cotton, wood and oil are
factored in, the benefits reach into the billions of dollars.

Historical records show that George Washington and Thomas Jefferson
both grew hemp on their estates as a cash crop. Hemp has been used in
the past to manufacture a variety of products. Hemp ropes were
considered the finest and strongest ropes available for many years. It
can be used to make cloth, and it provides superior paper. Hemp paper
was used for the draft copies of the Declaration of Independence, and
hemp cloth was used to make the first American flag.

The fiber from the hemp plant possesses strength and durability,
resists rotting and is easier to bleach than wood pulp, which means
whiter paper at lower cost. That would be a boon to the
book-publishing industry, to cite one example.

Hemp oil was used to lubricate the engines of Navy fighter planes in
World War II, and hemp activist Woody Harelson used it to power a
diesel vehicle to demonstrate the benefits of it. It can also be
fermented into an alcohol-based fuel, offering a potent and truly
renewable energy source.

Unlike trees, which take years to grow to the point at which they can
be harvested, hemp plants can reach a harvestable state within four
months. For paper manufacturers and users it could provide a cheaper
source of pulp than trees, which take too long to renew.

Hemp won't put an end to the logging industry, but it would spare some
forests from being cut down for paper products.

With all these things going for hemp, one has to wonder why we don't
allow it to be grown.

Unfortunately, common sense can go out the door pretty quickly when it
comes to the drug war. If marijuana is bad, then anything related to
it must be bad as well.

But industrial hemp is not marijuana. It contains just 0.3 to 1.5
percent of tetrohydrocannabinol, or THC, the chemical that gives
marijuana its drug-like effects.such as drowsiness, impaired memory
and increased appetite. By comparison, marijuana contains 5 percent to
10 percent THC. Smoking industrial hemp is not going to make anyone
high.

And even if you could get high on the industrial version, it's still
far milder than other mind-altering substances such as alcohol.
Compared to other things people abuse (and we'll include liquor in
this mix) marijuana is one of the most benign. While there is some
argument that it acts as a gateway to other drugs, you don't hear of
someone going berserk after smoking a joint. Marijuana users are
usually passive, in contrast to some alcohol users.

Lately, marijuana has gained official recognition as a beneficial drug
for certain cancer patients. It can reduce or eliminate the nausea
associated with chemotherapy and restore their appetites.

Weighing the risks against the benefits of a renewable plant that can
provide so many products and reduce America's oil dependence, it's
difficult to see why the law discriminates against industrial hemp.
You'd think we could prohibit only the most troublesome varieties
and reap billions in economic benefits.