HEMP Issue #7

THE FARM BILL’S FLAW | CBD FLOWER | HOME OIL EXTRACTION

ISSUE 7 Aug / Sep / Oct

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Winona LaDuke talks hemp and the Green New Deal H E M P. C O

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This bag of hemp, grown on a small farm in Montana, is destined for a home extraction.

Read more on page 31

editor’s note

Now that hemp is legal, we must ask ourselves what it will take for the plant to heal, rather than harm.

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Second, how should we harness hemp’s potential? In his essay on the plight of the honeybee, Associate Editor Joel Hathaway probes the claim that hemp can help struggling bee populations. His conclusion: Hemp might help the honeybees, but not if the plant is turned into yet another massive monoculture crop.

And third, what voices should lead the hemp movement? In my cover story conversation with LaDuke, she argues that the hemp industry will only achieve social, political, and environmental change if we prioritize the ideas of people who are stuck at the bottom of the economy today.

Whether you’ve come to HEMP because you have a budding CBD curiosity or because you’re forming an international hemp cultivation conglomerate, we hope that you’ll continue to ask questions about what the plant needs to heal, rather than harm.

Julia Clark-Riddell Executive Editor PHOTO TODD HEATH

what the hemp industry needs to do in this first year of federal legalization, the environmental and indigenous rights activist responded with characteristic optimism and wit.

“We have to be mindful of this magical moment, and we need to think out of the box,” she told me. “Our ancestors were guided by the stars, and today, most people need a GPS to get anywhere.”

Over the course of our conversation, LaDuke made clear just how far out of the box she thinks the hemp industry has to go. She’s on a mission to build a post-petroleum economy, and she believes that hemp has a role to play in that fossil-fuel-free future as a textile, a soil builder, and a medicine.

In this issue of HEMP, we follow LaDuke’s lead and ask a few key questions to help drive out-of-the-box thinking about where hemp should head.

First, who should this hemp industry support? In his feature on the “felony ban” hidden in the 2018 Farm Bill, reporter Kit O’Connell investigates the bill’s fine print and reveals the dire consequences of banning people with drug-related felonies from working in legal hemp.

WHEN I ASKED WINONA LADUKE

ISSUE SEVEN

On Winona LaDuke’s farm in northern Minnesota, the land is cultivated using teams of horses to plow the land instead of petroleum-powered tractors.

Read more on page 62

features

THE FELONY BAN: BEHIND THE ORIGINAL SIN OF THE 2018 FARM BILL 36

Built into the law that legalized hemp is a stipulation that advocates for social and racial justice worry will disproportionately lock poor people and people of color out of the hemp industry.

By Kit O’Connell

Recent reports have argued that hemp may be able to help struggling honeybee populations.

But over a decade after news of their decline first broke, what’s hurting the pollinating powerhouses remains complicated. By Joel Hathaway WINONA LADUKE WALKS THE WALK 62

HEMP talks with the renowned activist about her efforts to bring hemp back to the forefront on Native lands, create a post-petroleum economy, and more. By Julia Clark-Riddell

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PHOTO SARAH LITTLEREDFEATHER DESIGN

NOT QUITE SO SWEET: HEMP & THE HONEYBEE 46

ISSUE Seven

contents

FROM THE ARCHIVES: Hemp Meets Fine Art By Katie Way 77 HINDSIGHT 88 politics HEMP IS LEGAL! BUT WHAT’S NEXT? 15

The industry gets bogged down in the weeds of implementation. By Ben Droz THE BLOSSOMING MARKET FOR HEMP FLOWER 20

While most of the attention around the CBD boom is focused on tinctures and topicals, some growers have tapped into a burgeoning consumer desire for smokable hemp flower.

By A.J. Herrington

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industry

culture

HOME HEMP OIL EXTRACTION 31

PLAN A SUMMER HEMP PICNIC! 54

ASK THE HEMP HERO 43

By Liz Schoch

How one hemp company in Montana has converted a garage into a boutique hemp oil factory. By Robin A.W. Kelley

HEMP’s advice columnist dishes out hard truths and shares crucial guidance for navigating an industry often awash in misinformation.

By Kate Robertson

These three recipes can help you host the perfect hemp-inspired picnic, featuring a cheese plate with hemp crackers, a tabbouleh salad, and a berry tartlet for dessert.

FIVE BOOKS FOR THE HEMP LOVER’S LIBRARY 73

Gain five new perspectives on the hemp plant and its place in society with these essential reads. By K. Astre

THE LIST: HEMP FUN IN THE SUMMERTIME 81

Celebrate the sunshine with HEMP’s picks for the beach, the backyard, and the boardwalk.

PHOTO COURTESY OREGONIZED ALLIANCE

EDITOR’S NOTE 04

Hemp-sown fields await spring sunshine and rain at Fire Ridge Farms in Southern Oregon.

Publisher

Eugenio Garcia Creative Director

Todd Heath Executive Editor

Julia Clark-Riddell Associate Editor

Joel Hathaway Copy Editor

Katie Way Contributing Editor

Ben Droz Account Executives

Lindsey Mandelbaum Shelby Nelson Jason Rosenberg Support Associate

Andy Gavin Production Manager

Maria MacVean Advertising

sales @ thehempmag.com Stay Connected

facebook.com/hempmagazine instagram.com/hempmag twitter.com/hempmag

K. Astre Matt Brown Jenny Chang Francisco Freeman Francesco Guerrieri A.J. Herrington

Sarah Little Redfeather Robin A. W. Kelley Kit O’Connell Kate Robertson Liz Schoch Sara Sofia Wallach

On the Cover Environmental and indigenous activist Winona LaDuke stands in her hemp field in northern Minnesota.

Photo by Sarah Little Redfeather Design

H E M P. C O

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HEMP TODAY MEDIA, LLC

PHOTO COURTESY MATT BROWN, FIRE RIDGE FARMS

CONTRIBUTORS

contributor

ILLUSTRATIONS BY FRANCISCO FREEMAN

S P OTLI G HT

K. ASTRE

is a California writer with a global appetite for art, music, and culture. She fuels her creativity with tea, yoga, meditation and, of course, cannabis.

KIT O’CONNELL

is a freelance writer from San Diego, California covering hemp and cannabis. His work has been published by HEMP, High Times, OC Weekly, and other publications.

LIZ SCHOCH

A.J. HERRINGTON

is the editor-in-chief of the Ministry of Hemp. A gonzo journalist from Austin, Texas, his work has also appeared in Yes! Magazine, Truthout, Firedoglake, The Establishment, and the Texas Observer. is a nutritionist and creator of Inspector Gorgeous blog, where she creates plant-based, low-sugar recipes. She enjoys food photography, old cookbooks, and vegetarian sushi. You can find her work at inspectorgorgeous.com.

#hempmag 13

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state of hemp

HEMP IS L EGAL ! BU T W H AT ’S NE X T ?

The industry gets bogged down in the weeds of implementation.

Wo r d s a n d P h o t o s B y B e n D r o z

In late 2018, hemp became legal. In 2019, hemp became — dare I say — mainstream. Under the 2018 Farm Bill, hemp and its derivatives were removed from the Controlled Substances Act. For years, activists like myself dreamed of this day and imagined the floodgates opening to a new agriculture revolution. Now, hemp can finally be industrialized and turned into thousands of products, like cars, fuel, plastics, and toilet paper. So, when exactly will hemp be in everything?

As you probably are aware, regulators don’t always move very quickly. Once a law is passed, it must be put into effect through a sometimes-lengthy process of promulgation and implementation. The federal agencies that are tasked with regulating hemp must develop rules and processes for the new program.

Specifically, the Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have been tasked with the authority over hemp and hemp products.

Because this is a brand-new program, with snags to resolve with the DEA and banking regulators, it could take a while. In fact, it could take years, and the FDA has said it might be faster for Congress to pass a new bill specifically to address hemp and hemp-derived CBD. (Thanks to hemp’s popularity, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell says he is already working on it.)

So, as initial excitement about hemp legalization wanes, it’s clear that the hemp plant is just starting to walk down the long road toward being a true agricultural commodity. It could take

years for the full implementation of this law. Banks have yet to open the floodgates of capital. Law enforcement agencies are still grappling with distinguishing hemp from high-THC cannabis.

The USDA has heard from industry leaders and the FDA has accepted comments from the public.

So, for practical purposes, hemp is still in the pilot stage. But this is not necessarily bad. In fact, it could be the last break that small farmers get.

REGULATIONS SNAIL FORWARD

For the first time in generations, the USDA is now addressing the hemp question head-on. On March 13, the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service held a three-hour-long webinar for public comments, diving deep into issues in the hemp industry. The main message of the webinar: This isn’t going to be as easy as corn or cotton.

The webinar showed that the USDA has been making strong efforts and taking action to open the door for farmers. In April, Democratic Senators Patrick Leahy of Vermont and Jon Tester of Montana sent a letter to the Customs and Border Patrol requesting “immediate clarification to border agents” that imported viable hemp seed does not require DEA permits any longer. It took the USDA less than three days to publish a bulletin providing this clarification.

However, despite this quick action, USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue has made it clear on multiple occasions that it could take

#hempmag 15

This regulatory conflict is working its way towards a showdown: Big Pharma may not be ready to give up CBD without a fight, but the public might already have a taste for over-the-counter CBD gummies and cocktails.

A flag made from hemp textiles waves in the wind during a hemp advocacy event in front of the U.S. Capitol.

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many more months for the USDA to issue official guidelines for states programs. Perdue has said that the USDA is planning for its program to officially begin with the 2020 planting season.

Compared to the USDA, the FDA appears to have a more challenging mandate. The food and drug regulatory body has to figure out how to square a circle: It does not currently consider CBD to be a dietary supplement or food ingredient, because of its similarity to Epidiolex, the CBD pharmaceutical that was approved by the FDA in 2018 after years of clinical trials. However, corner stores, pharmacies, and mom-and-pop shops around the nation are already selling CBD products, and without regulation, there’s no way of ensuring product safety.

This regulatory conflict is working its way towards a showdown: Big Pharma may not be ready to give up CBD without a fight, but the public might already have a taste for over-the-counter CBD gummies and cocktails.

BANKING AND FINANCIAL SERVICES

Beyond the USDA and FDA regulations, one of the biggest barriers to major hemp commercialization is that hemp companies have long been denied even the most basic banking and financial services. This has meant that many basic businesses don’t even have bank accounts, and also hinders the large-scale production and development of industrial hemp fiber.

In April, Senators McConnell of Kentucky and Ron Wyden of Oregon sent letters to four federal banking institutions, “reiterating hemp’s legality and requesting timely guidance and clarification to help ease concerns from lawful hemp farmers and producers about the lack of access to financial services.” They requested that big banks update their internal protocols to accept hemp money, but change on that front has been sluggish.

THE HEMP PILOT PROGRAM: A BLESSING IN DISGUISE

Let’s go back to before the 2018 Farm Bill. When the 2014 Farm Bill passed, it included a small section called SEC 7606 that created the framework for states to build hemp pilot programs. This pilot program was, by most accounts, a good system for many small hemp producers. And until the regulations of full hemp legalization are put into place, SEC 7606 is still the guiding framework today.

With rules that could take months or years to issue, SEC 7606 gives us a clear path of what to do. Thanks to the “marketing” provision, SEC 7606 leaves the doors wide open to opportunity for hemp commerce. While banking restrictions have hindered the industry in many ways, they have also hindered large corporate entities from swooping in too fast. Small farmers can still produce local products and are building a supply chain of local producers and processors.

While the CBD rush has brought in some bad actors (the FDA has sent several warning letters since 2014), there is an authenticity to the industry, thanks to the activism it is rooted in. But when full commercialization comes, it will open the door to bigger fish — and gargantuan sharks. There is a real risk of a takeover from major corporate stakeholders: Big Tobacco, Big Alcohol, and Big Agriculture all have their sights set on the industry’s potential profits. When the 2018 Farm Bill is fully implemented, it could inadvertently transfer this incredible opportunity of untold potential directly into the hands the very corporations that have been the adversaries of hemp and environmental activists for so many years.

THE MOVEMENT’S MOMENT

Despite all of the barriers and challenges, hemp today is legal, and there is nothing now that can stop the revolution and evolution of this amazing crop. Decades and decades have led to this very special moment, the building of an industry from the ground up. Five years ago, SEC 7606 was brand new, and the earliest adopters planted their very first hemp fields. Five years from now, hemp and CBD could be in millions of products consumed by hundreds of millions of people throughout the world.

But right now, small farmers and entrepreneurs actually might still have the lead — and the ability to shape a brand new industry and policy. It would be easy to sell out right now, but that was never part of the plan for our plant, the vision of hemp that has the potential to transform rural America, heal people from pain and prescriptions, and slow down climate change. By sowing seeds now, we have an opportunity that we can only dream of.

In in the years to come, we will be able to make our dreams become reality.

#hempmag 17 13

Cannabis Marketing for Mobile | Outdoor | Social Media

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T H E B LO S S O M I N G M A R K E T FOR HEMP FLOWER While most of the attention around the CBD boom is focused on tinctures and topicals, some growers have tapped into a burgeoning consumer desire for smokable hemp flower.

By A . J. Herrington

PHOTO COURTESY OREGONIZED ALLIANCE

With the rebirth of hemp agriculture in the United States, farmers are still exploring new markets and opportunities. One emerging trend — spurred by the continued explosion of interest in cannabidiol (CBD) — involves consumers willing to pay top dollar for smokable hemp flower.

When dried and cured like medicinal or recreational cannabis, female hemp flowers can provide a satisfying experience for people looking to smoke without a desire to get high. Depending on the quality of the flower, smoking female hemp flower can also deliver a healthy dose of CBD and a flavorful terpene profile.

Derik Julian learned the craft of cultivating quality cannabis flowers for medical marijuana patients in Northern California, before moving to Southern Oregon in 2015 with the intent of growing for the recreational cannabis market.

But when he saw that market tank in 2016, as an overflow of supply dropped flower prices to record lows, he changed plans and decided to watch hemp’s prospects through the following year.

In 2018, Julian jumped into the hemp industry, formed his company, Oregonized Alliance, and planted 42 acres of feminized seed. Although most of the crop was harvested

and processed for extraction, a crew of 60 cut the flowering tops from five acres of plants, hanging them to cure in 30,000 square feet of drying space Julian had at his disposal.

Julian takes pride in his crop, saying, “a lot of states can do their best to harvest quality flower, but they can’t compete with Oregon’s sun and climate. The microclimate here is so similar to Northern California. It’s the best.”

Julian’s crop was part of a 2018 hemp flower market worth $11.5 million across the nation, up 250% from the previous year, according to an estimate from Brightfield Group.

“We identified it as one of the fastest-growing segments of the CBD market this year,” Bethany Gomez, a hemp analyst for the cannabis research group, told Hemp Industry Daily. “It’s a trend that’s still very much developing, so it’s hard to tell whether it has a long-term play.”

Julian suggests that farmers who put the effort into producing quality flower stand firm with a price that reflects their care. He says while some large companies were buying truckloads of flower for $150 per pound, he was able to command $500 from specialty CBD retailers for last year’s crop.

“At the end of the day, buyers don’t set prices,” says Julian.

#hempmag 21

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PHOTO COURTESY OREGONIZED ALLIANCE

NO, THIS ISN’T MARIJUANA. It’s hemp! That’s because this Cannabis sativa L. plant from Oregonized Alliance has less than 0.3% THC, which is the only legal barrier between hemp and marijuana. In the past, the hemp plant was tall and bamboo-like — without any gigantic flower buds — and grown for seed and fiber. However, in 2019, only a small percentage of American hemp farmers still cultivate those tall varietals. Instead, most farmers now grow the bushier hemp varietals that have been bred to produce huge flower buds and minimal THC. That’s because of two main factors: the rising demand for cannabinoids like CBD (which grow on the flower, not the fiber) and the federal legality of hemp compared to THC-heavy cannabis, or “marijuana.” This is all to say that today, hemp can look exactly as “dank” as marijuana.

#hempmag 23

Sunshine lights of the leaves of hemp plants in one of Oregonized Alliance’s fields.

“ A lot of states can do their best to harvest quality flower, but they can’t compete with Oregon’s sun and climate. The microclimate here is so similar to Northern California. It’s the best.” – D e r i k J u l i a n

PHOTO COURTESY OREGONIZED ALLIANCE

ROLLING OUT NEW HEMP FLOWER PRODUCTS

Plenty of farmers are also growing hemp for flower in states without a legal cannabis industry, as hemp flower can appeal to consumers who might otherwise buy cannabis flower with THC. Andrew Miller is an entrepreneur tapping into the potential of the hemp flower market in Missouri. In 2016, California’s cannabis legalization measure ironically led to the end of his medical marijuana collective, so Miller moved to St. Louis, Missouri. Once there, he scouted out new opportunities in the cannabis marketplace, including specialty rolling papers with a beeswax tip sold under the brand Spaced Cowboy, which he calls “the biggest advancement to the rolling paper since the cone.”

Miller then saw the chance to pair his new product with a hot new trend.

“Once the [2018] Farm Bill passed in December, in Missouri they started getting hemp flower everywhere,” he says. “And I thought, ‘How do we get in on this?’ I was looking at all the [hemp] joints they were selling at stores, literally at gas stations, all over the place — you can get them anywhere now. They were all pretty subpar.”

Miller was soon making connections with growers producing quality hemp flower and using the wax-dipped papers to produce pre-rolled joints.

“So, we went out and found some pretty good flower,” he says. “All the strains we’ve come across were over 17% CBD and under the 0.3% THC limit. And it’s pretty tasty stuff.”

Miller explains that there is an appeal to smoking or vaporizing hemp flower, even though there isn’t enough THC to cause a high.

#hempmag 25

“For me, I like [hemp joints] because because I quit smoking cigarettes with them. Now it’s more of a social thing. Instead of having a cigarette with that glass of wine, you have yourself a CBD joint.”

– ANDREW MILLER

“My wife, if she has trouble sleeping or wakes up in the middle of the night, she doesn’t smoke pot, but she will have a couple drags on a CBD joint and she’ll be able to go right back to sleep,” he says. “I hear a lot of women are using it for cramps. We get a lot of people who are trying to wean themselves off of alcohol or whatever other substance they used.”

“For me, I like them because I quit smoking cigarettes with them,” he says. “Now it’s more of a social thing. Instead of having a cigarette with that glass of wine, you have yourself a CBD joint.”

RETAIL CONNECTING WITH CONSUMERS

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PHOTO COURTESY OREGONIZED ALLIANCE

Ian Williams and his partners are selling hemp flower packaged in jars under their Evolution Organics brand, $40 for an eighth-ounce or $60 per quarter-ounce, at two Wilmington Hemp Clinic stores in North Carolina they opened this year. He says that the stores’ signage, combined with the fact that his brother and partner dance in cannabis-leaf print suits in front of the store, has made folks curious.

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“ The 2018 hemp flower market was valued at $11.5 million across the nation, up 250% from the previous year, according to an estimate from Brightfield Group.”

“We have a lot of people coming in, asking about flower all the time, wanting to learn more about it, to get more educated about hemp,” Williams says.

He’s also a fan himself, saying, “I use it pretty much every day for anxiety, helping with sleep.” Williams says that most of his customers are seeking the benefits of CBD. “A lot of the people who are coming in for the smokable flower are looking for something that is going to help alleviate things like anxiety — that tends to be a really big one.”

From offering a relaxing and flavorful method of consuming CBD to providing a new source of income for farmers and small businesspeople, smokable flower is a growing segment of the hemp marketplace. But with most consumer sales appearing to occur in states that don’t have legal cannabis flower, it remains to be seen how lasting a market it can be as legalization continues to spread to those areas.

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H O M E H E M P O I L E X T R AC T I O N How one hemp company in Montana has converted a garage into a boutique hemp oil factory.

PHOTOS COURTESY GW PHARMACEUTICALS

B y R o b i n A .W. Ke l l ey | P h o t o s by To d d H e a t h

In Ryan Watson’s previous career working with a local brewery, he became enamored with the idea of terroir, or “taste of place” — a flavor profile that occurs in a product when it is grown in one location, conveying a unique odor and taste based on the unique environment. About a year ago, Watson realized that he wanted to create hemp products with terroir. He set about making a farm-to-table product: homegrown, full-spectrum hemp oil in Bozeman, Montana.

But without a huge pile of investment capital, Watson knew he’d have to make do with limited resources.

Watson, along with his business partner and friend Jamie Fitterer, decided to purchase used CO2 extraction equipment. They bought it from another business, and discovered that the vibrant green machine could easily fit in the repurposed garage they use as the shop for their new company, Montana Hemp Co.

Measuring approximately two by five by six feet, the machine now takes up a small footprint in the open shop space, allowing for room to work around it and enough space to park a car, if the snowy Montana winters necessitate. Run by electric power, the self-contained equipment is totally quiet and virtually odor-free, which makes it an unobtrusive resident.

But, given the bootstrapped nature of the project, there have certainly been roadblocks along the way.

First, navigating the capabilities of the equipment has been a learning process, Watson says. Even though they bought a used machine, the equipment wasn’t cheap, costing well above a farmer’s pay grade. On top of that, it didn’t include instructions.

“I’ve had to rewire the machine without any direction,” says Watson.

#hempmag 31

The equipment they bought is designed for the small farmer who is developing their own product. It takes three and a half hours to extract oil from three to five pounds of material, leaving an average of 8% of the raw material, or 30 grams of oil equaling 60 bottles at a time, which is then bottled and labeled by hand.

Even with the inflated cost of extraction equipment, small hemp farmers like Watson often run into obstacles when it comes to processing, particularly when trying to customize the extraction process.

“The price for these machines is exacerbated, and most farmers do not have the time or resources to be thinking about developing their own processing systems,” Watson says.

He says that they chose CO2 extraction over other methods because they wanted “the ability to leave the chlorophyll behind” in order to create an oil that doesn’t taste grassy.

When it comes to sourcing the flower to extract, Watson says he has learned through trial and error that “each variety of the hemp plant has a different reaction to extraction.” For example, he says “the plant may test within the THC limit in the field but tests ‘hot’ once it’s been compressed.” When this happens, the farmer-turned-extractor is responsible for calculating the dilution rate to meet legal standards.

“We’re asking farmers to be scientists,” says Watson.

Finally, there are ongoing challenges regarding the legality

32 thehempmag.com

for home hemp extraction. Today, Watson is working with the Montana state branches of the USDA and the Department of Health and Human Services to create an approved product. At the time of publication, Montana regulations fall back to the 2014 Farm Bill, which states that processing must take place on-site and does not allow for farmers to collaborate with other farmers on extraction.

In the meantime, there are still incredible barriers at the federal level for hemp-derived CBD products looking for a pathway to the market. Currently, the FDA does not consider hemp-derived CBD oil or isolate CBD to be a food product.

Only oil from hemp seeds is “generally recognized as safe” by the FDA, though the agency has stated it is working on a regulatory framework to be released in the coming months.

Considering what the future might look like as a whole for hemp products and the FDA, hemp and cannabis lawyer Cristina Buccola, founder of CB Counsel, says, “There are meetings that are happening at the FDA level. There is a task force that is being formed. And there are senators who were very instrumental in passing the [2018 Farm Bill] that are now pushing the FDA to reach some kind of path forward.”

Buccola continues: “If we really want this to be America’s next great crop, we should have much more clear guidelines so those individuals who want to be state and federally compliant can be.”

“If we really want this to be America’s next great crop, we should have much more clear guidelines so those individuals who want to be state and federally compliant can be.”

– Cristina Buccola

Ryan Watson stands in front of his extraction equipment, explaining the difficulties of extraction for the small farmer.

#hempmag 33 17

Watson surveys the ground where he’s building a geodesic dome to protect his 2019 hemp crop from the fickle Montana spring.

“ We want to have a localized product that we can sell in local stores. What’s going to move hemp ahead is the small farmer.” — R Y A N W A T S O N

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Ultimately, Montana Hemp Co.’s goal is to offer processing to small farmers in Montana and parts of the Northwest. Watson dreams of an exceptional program that will benefit small farmers by using fees wisely and allowing for a cooperative model of hemp growth and processing.

“We’ve had a difficult time, and the amount of testing and money spent have not been without burden,” Watson says. “We want to have a localized product that we can sell in local stores. What’s going to move hemp ahead is the small farmer. We want to get it in [the governor’s] hands and in the hands of the Montana USDA, where they can approve it and take it to the stores.”

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T H E F E LO N Y B A N : BEHIND THE ORIGINAL S I N O F T H E 2 0 1 8 FA R M B I L L Built into the law that legalized hemp is a stipulation that advocates for social and racial justice worry will disproportionately lock poor people and people of color out of the hemp industry.

B y K i t O ’ C o n n e l l | I l l u s t r a t i o n by J e n n y C h a n g

Within the next few years, the hemp industry could bring in billions in profits, but who stands to benefit most from those profits, and who will get left behind?

One clause buried in the 2018 Farm Bill, often colloquially called “the felony ban,” is already playing a role in determining who exactly will have a place to work in the legal hemp industry.

While the 2018 Farm Bill is famous for federally legalizing hemp by removing the plant and its derivatives from the Controlled Substances Act, it also banned many people with past drug felony convictions from participating in the industry.

According to Section 297b of the bill, anyone with a drugrelated felony conviction that’s less than 10 years old is barred from being a “producer” in the hemp industry. There’s only one exception: If that producer participated in the industry through a legal hemp program under the 2014 Farm Bill, they are exempted from the ban.

Some states are considering restricting entry to the industry even further. Louisiana, as of the time of this writing, is debating a bill that would extend the ban on people with felonies entering the industry to include anyone with a misdemeanor drug conviction as well.

While the nation-wide felony ban received some attention in industry media and pushback from hemp advocates during the debate over the Farm Bill, the potential consequences have received relatively little attention amid celebrations of hemp’s legalization after the bill’s passage.

Grant Smith, deputy director for national affairs at the Drug Policy Alliance, says that the felony ban amounts to a second punishment for convicted criminals.

“These people, they’ve served their sentence and done their time and they don’t deserve to be penalized a second time, and denied the very job opportunity that could provide stability in

their lives,” he says.

Proponents of the felony ban see it as a way to make sure the hemp industry doesn’t overlap with the still-federally illegal cannabis industry. But the data is clear: People of color are disproportionately charged with drug-related felonies, and will therefore disproportionately be kept out of the hemp industry.

A handful of activists are pushing back, and trying to make sure the hemp industry accounts for the racist history of the war on drugs.

LIMITS OF THE FELONY BAN REMAIN UNCLEAR

The felony ban can be traced back to one man: Senate Majority Leader and Republican Senator from Kentucky, Mitch McConnell.

It was McConnell’s plan to get hemp legalization passed as an amendment through the 2018 Farm Bill, and it worked. But when McConnell added his original amendment to the Senate version of the bill to legalize hemp, his language included a ban that was far harsher that the final one. McConnell’s amendment banned anyone with a drug felony from entering the hemp industry, regardless of how old the felony was or if they were already involved in the industry.

Smith and the Drug Policy Alliance, along with numerous stakeholders in the hemp industry, including the nonprofit Vote Hemp, successfully lobbied to change the original proposal for the felony ban as the bill moved toward passage in late 2018.

They were able to lower the ban to 10 years after the date of conviction and include the exception for established state-legal hemp farmers with a felony.

However, Smith still called the revised version a “de facto ban” on anyone with a drug felony in their past. “A lot happens in a person’s life in 10 years,” he says.

#hempmag 37

He believes the ban serves no purpose other than to perpetuate the stigma around hemp and cannabis, saying: “There’s no merit.

There’s no logic to having it. There is no public safety value.”

McConnell could not be reached for comment.

The scope of the ban, in terms of which types of jobs might be affected, is also somewhat unclear to Smith. The 2018 Farm Bill essentially legalized hemp by removing it from under the control of the Drug Enforcement Administration and passing responsibility for writing regulations to the Department of Agriculture.

But, as of now, the Department of Agriculture is still writing a national hemp policy and isn’t expected to release its final guidance for months.

The USDA will have some leeway in how it implements the ban.

Based on the guidance in the Farm Bill, Smith says he believes it should only refer to whoever applies for the actual grower’s or producer’s license for hemp, and not anyone working under the license holder. However, until the USDA releases their final policy, it’s not clear if additional people might be affected.

Through lobbying and participation in comment public periods, the Drug Policy Alliance and other advocates for equitable drug policy are “working to ensure this is applied as narrowly as possible,” Smith said.

However, even the narrowest interpretation, he says, “[It] is still going to harm people.”

FELONY BAN WILL HURT SOME MORE THAN OTHERS

While hemp has the potential to revitalize rural areas that once depended on other kinds of agriculture, Smith pointed out that the felony ban could potentially leave some residents in these areas unable to participate in a major new economy. That could mean missing out on jobs where they’re needed most.

Race is a major factor in determining who receives a felony for drug crimes. Research consistently shows that while white and black people use cannabis at about the same rates, black people are far more likely to face arrest and more likely to face harsher legal penalties. Despite an increasing number of states legalizing recreational or medicinal cannabis, thousands of people are still arrested every year for simple possession of cannabis — and the majority of those people are black, Latinx, or indigenous.

In one example, the nonprofit Vera Institute of Justice looked at all drug-related arrests in New Orleans between 2010 and 2015.

While black people represent 60% of the city’s population, they made up 85% of the people arrested for marijuana possession and 94% of those arrested for felony possession charges.

Similar patterns, with regional variations, play out throughout the country and on a national level. According to statistics published by the Drug Policy Alliance, 659,700 people were arrested for violating marijuana laws in 2017 and, of those, 90% were for possession.

“People of color disproportionately pay the price and communities of color are more likely to be affected [by the War on Drugs],” Smith says.

SO, WHO GETS LEFT BEHIND IN THE NEW HEMP INDUSTRY?

“It’s unfair, it’s unjust, and it’s un-American,” says Felicia Carbajal, an experienced advocate for equity in the cannabis and hemp industries. “I think [the felony ban] should be offensive to every black and brown person in this country.”

Carbajal first became involved with cannabis equity after watching people with HIV in the Latinx queer community use cannabis for relief. Her experience includes working with CBD pioneer Allan Frankel a decade ago. She’s been raising issues of racial equity in cannabis since before the plant was legalized in California in 2016.

“It’s offensive to not offer opportunities to people who bore the brunt of prohibition,” she says.

As part of her advocacy work with coalitions like the Equity First Alliance, an activist group seeking racial justice in the cannabis industry, Carbajal is helping to cultivate new opportunities for people of color. When we spoke on the phone recently, she was stuck in traffic on the way to Los Angeles Trade Technical College, where students were holding a hemp expo. LA Trade Tech was the first college in the area to promote hemp, but Carbajal worries that students she works with may be shut out by the felony ban.

Carbajal says it’s part of a long tradition where policies aren’t created by the people who suffer the most from them. “The people pushing the conversations [around legal cannabis and hemp] don’t look like people of color, they don’t come from the communities impacted.”

She also points out that the policy is reflective of systematic racism as a whole. Decades of racist policies like redlining, along with the economic consequences of the war on drugs, leave black people and people of color at a disadvantage when it comes to entering a newly legalized industry like hemp.

“Most people of color don’t own property, whether it’s a farm or not, because of the systematic degradation of communities of color,” she says. “Why do communities of color not have the same resources? Because they were never given the opportunity.”

EMPOWERING BLACK HEMP FARMERS AT GREEN HEFFA FARMS

According to a report published by the Pew Research Center on April 1, black farmers represent only 1.4% of the country’s 3.2 million farmers.

While these numbers represent overall farming rather than specifically hemp, they help underline the scope of the problem regarding equity in agriculture. Carbajal stresses that there are few recorded statistics documenting the level of involvement of black people or people of color in legal hemp industry, but it’s easy to see how and why the industry is overwhelmingly white.

A black hemp farmer named Clarenda Stanley-Anderson, better known online as Farmer Cee, is also working to change the racial imbalance in the hemp industry. Along with her husband,

Clarenda Stanely-Anderson (right) operates Green Heffa Farms with her husband, Malcolm Anderson, in North Carolina, where they’re working to bring more people of color into the hemp industry.

38 thehempmag.com

Stanley-Anderson says the felony ban perpetuates the stigma around hemp, even as the very people pushing for legalization are working to dismantle the perception that hemp is a dangerous drug.

#hempmag 39

Malcolm Anderson, they operate Green Heffa Farms in Liberty, North Carolina. Stanley-Anderson was recently honored as the featured hemp farmer of this year’s Hemp History Week, an educational event that takes place nationwide.

Last year, their farm grew three acres of hemp, with plans to expand. They also plan to build a greenhouse where they can grow hemp year-round, and teach more classes to future black hemp farmers.

Stanley-Anderson describes Green Heffa as a “social equity” farm, where their goal is to get more people of color involved in the industry and help them realize they have a stake in its development.

She identifies two key reasons why black people have stayed away from hemp farming. One, “farming is too close to slavery,” she says. Two, most farmers work long hours for limited profits, which is a risky sacrifice to make without a strong safety net.

However, she says hemp is changing that. She notes many of the students who come to the classes they teach are “intergenerational.” Young people excited by the prospects of hemp are attending along with their parents or grandparents who hope to pass on their lands or farming traditions to their kids and grandkids. “[Hemp] gives farming a totally different look,” she says.

40 thehempmag.com

IS HEMP A COMMODITY OR A DANGEROUS DRUG?

Not only is the felony ban discriminatory, Stanley-Anderson pointed out it will exclude talented, knowledgeable people from the industry, at a time when talent is badly needed.

“We know people who are the best growers out there,” she says, “but they can’t get a license because they were busted with weed at 18 or 19.”

Stanley-Anderson says the felony ban perpetuates the stigma around hemp, even as the very people pushing for legalization are working to dismantle the perception that hemp is a dangerous drug, saying “If it’s a commodity, your policies don’t demonstrate that.”

While the hemp industry wants hemp to be seen as a completely separate plant from marijuana, and treated like any other crop, the felony ban shows it’s still considered dangerous by some.

“Would you stop [people with a drug-related felony] from growing heirloom tomatoes?” asks Stanley-Anderson.

While McConnell recently stated he’s open to supporting more legislation to help protect the new hemp industry, it’s unclear whether that could include revisiting the felony ban. While it’s hard to pin down for sure, multiple industry experts seem to believe the idea for the ban came from the Department of Justice itself.

“ Black farmers have been integral to the agricultural infrastructure of this country, why wouldn’t you want them? ” — C l a r e n d a S t a n l e y - A n d e r s o n

“There’s probably not much appetite to take this up,” Smith says. But, “it’s something the Drug Policy Alliance will continue to raise and look for opportunities to repeal.”

THE HEMP INDUSTRY MUST CREATE UNITY, NOT SOW DIVISION

In the meantime, Stanley-Anderson believes the hemp industry needs to be open to frank, honest discussions about the problems created by systematic racism and the felony ban.

“So far, I’ve been underwhelmed by the response from people outside those already involved in social justice movements or already involved in the cannabis or hemp equity movements,” she says. “We still have a long way to go in 2019 and people don’t want to have that conversation. It’s uncomfortable, it’s an admission of past wrongs.”

She often feels resistance to these topics from hemp industry professionals.

“People say if it’s about equity, the only color that should matter is green,” she says. “We want to get to that point, but we have to address a few issues before we get there.”

She says she believes difficult conversations are necessary.

“Sugarcoating isn’t going to solve it, it’s just going to create more inequity,” she says. “As long as we have inequity, there’s going to be tension.”

Both Stanley-Anderson and Carbajal express the need for unity to build a stronger hemp industry and ultimately help the planet itself through the sustainable promise of the plant.

“The community has to come together and support each other’s conversations,” Carbajal says. With the right support, she speculates that hemp could become “a key tenet of the Green New Deal.”

“People who have resources need to figure out how to share them,” continues Carbajal. “They need to support communityled organizations that are working on bringing us together.”

Stanley-Anderson stresses that equity “[is] not about charity or pity. It’s about making sure that everyone has a shot, especially those who have been criminalized the most.”

Besides, inclusivity strengthens hemp’s future. “Black farmers have been integral to the agricultural infrastructure of this country,” she says. “Why wouldn’t you want them?

It’ll make a better industry.”

Despite her frustration at the tepid response she sometimes receives to raising issues of race in hemp, Stanley-Anderson is ultimately optimistic: “I think this is an industry that can unify us, and be an example to other industries.”

Malcolm Anderson (left) stands on the Green Heffa Farm in North Carolina, where he and his wife Stanley-Anderson grew three acres of hemp last year. This year, they plan to build a greenhouse to grow more hemp and teach classes that will foster the next generation of black hemp farmers.

#hempmag 41

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AS K T H E H E M P H E R O HEMP’s advice columnist dishes out hard truths and shares crucial guidance for navigating an industry often awash in misinformation.

By Kate Robertson

Hi Hemp Hero, Now that the Farm Bill has passed, I’m thinking about leaving my full-time job to start my own company working with hemp.

Any advice for someone who’s brand new to the industry?

Sincerely, Hemp Newb

Hi Hemp Newb,

Welcome to the wild, fast-paced world of cannabis sativa.

While I can’t guarantee that you’ll find success in the growing hemp industry, I can promise you one thing: This industry is never boring.

For everyone else catching up: The 2018 Farm Bill has made it federally legal to cultivate hemp and transport it across state lines — a first for the United States since before World War II. So long as your hemp plants have less than 0.3% THC, you can now develop all kinds of hemp products and share them beyond your home state!

But you’re not the only person who harbors not-so-secret fantasies of working in the hemp industry, so it’ll take some smarts to make sure you can secure a job and find your niche. Here are a few tips I can share before you set off on your journey.

ILLUSTRATION BY FRANCISCO FREEMAN

THE “HEMP INDUSTRY” MEANS A LOT OF DIFFERENT THINGS

The first step is to research and identify your focus within the hemp industry. Do you want to grow nutritious, vegan hemp food? Do you want to supply real estate developers with eco-friendly, super-strong building materials made from hemp?

Do you want to extract CBD from hemp or develop your own wellness products?

For Jennifer Babaian, founder and CEO of 7 Leaf Clover, a chain of “hemp-wellness” shops in New York state, pivoting from a health and vitamins focus to hemp was about fulfilling

a need she was hearing from her clients, rather than fulfilling a quest to work with a specific product or imagining what people might need.

“Maybe five years ago, we had a large influx of customers who have children with autism who began asking a lot of questions about CBD,” she told me over the phone. “And we didn’t really have a lot of feedback for them because we didn’t know a lot. But we just kept on getting requests from these parents who were desperate to do anything to ameliorate their children’s lives in any way possible.

They cared about what we think because they had come to us for so many years for their other vitamin needs.”

She and her business partner began researching cannabidiol.

They asked: What constitutes a dose and how is it consumed?

What kinds of ailments could it treat and are there any contraindications? Who is creating trusted, regulated products her clients could trust to give their children?

It’s absolutely crucial that you engage in this level of research before jumping in. Do not assume that because the laws are in flux, you’re a pioneer — entrepreneurs have been staking a claim in the hemp world for a while.

LOCATION, LOCATION, LOCATION

It’s also important to understand who has already set up a competing business in your market, whether they’re in your state or not.

In Oregon, for example, cannabis cultivation licenses weren’t limited to local growers and non-local farmers flooded the market, which drove the price of cannabis down without enough people to sell all of their product to. You can imagine how eager this contingent must be to access markets outside of

#hempmag 43

Fire Ridge Farms planted over 300,000 hemp seeds by hand at their facility in Southern Oregon. Here they grow, weeks after planting.

the state — but also how these entrepreneurs have had time to perfect operations, scale their businesses up, and form all-important relationships that could make or break the next phase of growth.

“ Do not assume that because the laws are in flux, you’re a pioneer — entrepreneurs have been staking a claim in the hemp world for a while.”

That brings me to my final, all-important tip: Find your people.

Who are “your people”?

They’re individuals in your professional network who share your values and will help reinforce the kind of company you want to build through both solicited and unsolicited advice (also known as friendship in non-professional settings!).

Babaian says that this is what surprised her most of all about the hemp industry when she first joined it: How frequently she came across people that didn’t share her values as she started sourcing brands to supply her stores.

“We tested products that came back with synthetic marijuana, but that had ‘all-natural’ on the label,” she says. “The lack of integrity in the space was mind-blowing. There was no huge incentive to be so dishonest. And also having done our research about edibles being made in batches instead of individually infused — like there’s just a right way and a wrong way of doing this, it was just really distasteful, not from an elitist perspective, but from a serving your community and doing right by your customers kind of thing.”

Do your due diligence and do your absolute best to develop professional relationships with people who share your values and goals. You’ll serve your yourself — and your customers — much, much better as a result.

Stay green, Hemp Hero

32 thehempmag.com 44

PHOTO COURTESY MATT BROWN, FIRE RIDGE FARMS

CONNECTING WITH YOUR NETWORK

46 thehempmag.com

NOT QUITE SO SWEET: HEMP & THE HONE YBEE Recent reports have argued that hemp may be able to help struggling honeybee populations. But over a decade after news of their decline first broke, what’s hurting the pollinating powerhouses remains complicated.

B y J o e l H a t h a w ay | I l l u s t r a t i o n by F r a n c i s c o F r e e m a n

A funny thing happened in November 2006.

David Hackenberg, a Pennsylvania beekeeper tending to his hives in Florida, went on a routine check. What he found was startling: After opening up his hives, he discovered that there were very few honeybees present, which was an abnormality. He checked around the hives, but couldn’t find any perished bees — another abnormality.

Hackenberg’s discovery alerted beekeepers in the United States of a serious — and potentially catastrophic — problem that was later named colony collapse disorder (CCD). But the phenomenon wasn’t entirely new. It had happened sporadically throughout history, though in Europe in the mid1990s, it had started to occur with startling frequency.

But somehow, news of what was happening in Europe had been largely ignored, until U.S. beekeepers like Hackenberg reported their colonies were collapsing too.

Once the problem was on U.S. soil, it was finally considered a problem. Print and television media quickly picked up the story. Alarm bells rang.

The American public soon found out that honeybees, apart from simply creating something delicious, are important. As in our entire food production system is dependent on them important. The American Beekeeping

Federation estimates that honeybees contribute $20 billion to the value of U.S. agriculture annually through increased yields and superior-quality harvests. And if they did in fact disappear, we’d be, well, up a certain creek without a paddle.

So, a decade later, everything’s okay, right?

Well, the rapid decline of the honeybee has forced us to pay attention. Researchers and beekeepers are searching for solutions — sometimes finding answers, sometimes more questions.

What they’ve found paints a complicated picture of what’s affecting honeybees. The fate of the honeybee may be tied to the way in which we’ve altered our environment to suit the needs of a ballooning human population, as well as diseases and pests that can more effectively target honeybees already suffering from poor health related to habitat loss.

But with knowledge comes the power to act. By reengineering our current environment into one that is healthier for pollinators, we can change the honeybee narrative. Some feel hemp offers an opportunity to help provide a solution.

But in order to seize that opportunity, we need to think about how and what types of hemp we are growing as the money pours into our post-2018 Farm Bill world.

#hempmag 47

IDENTIFYING THE CULPRIT

In the immediate aftermath of the CCD crisis, theories abounded as to what the cause was. Some were the usual ideas put forth in times of uncertainty: a government experiment gone wrong, Russian sabotage, aliens, the rapture.

But the most ardently discussed (and much more plausible) cause for the phenomenon revolved around a class of pesticides known as neonicotinoids. Initially, the amount of evidence supporting their role in CCD was strong enough that several European governments banned specific neonicotinoids thought to be causing CCD. While individual states have restricted the use of neonicotinoids, on a federal level the U.S. has failed to act in any meaningful way.

For much of the public, the story of the honeybee ends there: Honeybees are threatened and pesticides are the culprit.

In a way, neonicotinoids being the sole culprit would have been

— has appeared. Yes, neonicotinoids are bad for honeybees.

But figuring out what’s causing the plight of the honeybee is, unfortunately, more complicated than simply banning certain pesticides.

“I always talk about bees, birds, bats, and butterflies, because that’s what we’re witnessing, the sixth great extinction right now,” says Nick French, owner of Colorado Hemp Honey. French sells CBD-infused hemp honey and manages about 150 colonies of honeybees on his farm in Douglas County, Colorado.

“There are lots of other species that are dying, but the ones you hear about are the bees,” French continues. “These [different species], they’re all dying off at alarming rates. And it’s a combination of things. People always ask me, ‘What’s killing the bees?’ I say, ‘It’s not one thing, it’s everything.’”

French, like many etymologists studying honeybee and insect population declinations, believes that an intensive combination of human-caused environmental factors is eroding honeybee health in general, and thus their numbers.

Illustrating the issue, French says: “Imagine a six-legged table, where each one of those legs represents a factor affecting bees. One leg is a polluted city environment. Another one is a lack of forage and genetically modified crops. Another one is for mites. Another one might be other diseases that affect bees.

Some people say migratory beekeeping is to blame. Well, that table cannot stand if you pull those legs out from under it. In other words, bees cannot evolve fast enough to overcome all these different changes that are happening in the environment.”

IT’S NOT JUST BEES THAT ARE IN TROUBLE

a best-case scenario. Eventually, under pressure from an array of lobbying groups and the public at large, we likely could have convinced our representatives to vote against the corporate interests that fund their campaigns.

But as we’ve continued to study CCD, a more complex picture — one that tells the all-too-familiar story of unintended consequences of human-caused ecosystem alteration

48 thehempmag.com

Insects in general are disappearing at alarming rates, scientists say.

In a study published in Science Direct in early 2019, Francisco Sánchez-Bayo, an environmental scientist and ecologist at the University of Sydney, and Kris A.G. Wyckhuys, a Belgian bioscience engineer and insect ecologist, wrote about their recent compilation of 73 historical reports detailing insect populations from around the globe.

What they found was shocking. According to the study, over 40% of global insect populations are threatened with extinction over the next few decades. Two recent studies, in particular, have scientists concerned.

Citing a 2017 study, the authors write: “A 27-year-long population monitoring study revealed a shocking 76% decline in flying insect biomass at several of Germany’s protected areas.”

And, summarizing a 2018 study, they state: “[A] recent study in rainforests of Puerto Rico has reported biomass losses between 98% and 78% for ground-foraging and canopy-dwelling arthropods over a 36-year period, with respective annual losses between 2.7% and 2.2%.”

Even if you’re an entomophobe (someone who is scared of all those creepy crawlies), that’s still bad news. Beyond pollination, insects are essential to a host of processes unique to each ecosystem that they thrive in. And many animals rely on insects as their primary or only food source. If we lose all of the insects, it will simply be one wave in a waterfall of disastrous consequences.

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The issues facing honeybees are issues familiar to other insects, says Arathi Seshadri, a professor at Colorado State University who specializes in pollination and plant production.

“One thing is that when we are trying to understand what is going on with honeybees, it actually opens up a broader question,” she says. “The fact is, it’s not just honey bees, it’s actually all pollinators that are experiencing this, because the kinds of challenges that the bees are facing apply to not just this one genus, but across the board apply to a lot of beneficial insects and pollinators that are all dependent on the same kinds of things.”

In particular, Seshadri says pollinators are suffering from a lack of habitat, and subsequently, access to food.

“Wildflowers and other plants are not present anymore, either because we have eliminated them by using herbicides and chemicals, or these areas have become developed into newer agricultural areas, or they have become urbanized areas just because the human population is growing,” she says. “We are just extensively destroying the natural habitat to meet human needs.”

That synopsis aligns with what Sánchez-Bayo and Wyckhuys found. They describe the issues driving insect decline, appearing in order of what they deem importance, as habitat loss as wild areas turn into agricultural and urban land, pollution mostly from synthetic pesticides and fertilizers, diseases, and climate change.

But when it comes to honeybees, both Seshadri and French offer up plenty of hope as a side to go along with the heaps of sobering reality.

Seshadri says that everything from large-scale farming operations diversifying their crops and restoring wildflowers for pollinators to your choices in your backyard can help move the needle in the right way.

“People are becoming aware and there are several different kinds of efforts to improve pollinator habitat,” says Seshadri. “One of the things that we are trying to get across is that people usually end up blaming the chemicals. And it’s not always the chemicals that are to blame.”

She says that by planting native species in your yard, you can both provide food for pollinators and lessen your usage of water, because native plants are adapted to the environment.

Speaking about the prevalence of that idyllic, weed-free Kentucky Bluegrass, Seshadri says home owners should challenge themselves never to use chemicals in their own backyards. “If you’re in urban areas, in your backyard, do we need chemicals at all?” she asks.

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Honeybees, at least, have an advantage over most insects.

Because they’re so essential to our food systems, we breed and reproduce them to replenish their numbers when they’re threatened. Prior to CCD, beekeepers reported losses of between 15% and 20% annually, per USDA surveys. Over the last decade, that number has roughly doubled. The falling honeybee numbers means that beekeepers are suffering a financial toll, which ripples into higher prices at the supermarket. While this population loss and price jump shouldn’t be shrugged off, beekeepers have at least been able to keep us from a complete species collapse by reproducing honeybees.

So, if we can force honeybee populations to reproduce, why are their numbers still declining?

EC IMO SE NA NOC TR E E N O EH O B PM T g ra a o I ey t LL F re gni O I r

By the Numbers

worth of annual global food production relies on pollinators Sources: FAO, American Beekeeping Federation, Cornell University, PLOS, The Royal Society of Biological Sciences

#hempmag 49

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Total US-managed honey beeBEE colonies loss LOSS estimates TOTAL U.S.-MANAGED HONEY COLONIES ESTIMATES 50% 45% 40% 35% Total loss

30% 25% 20% 15% 10% 5% 0%

2010/11

2011/12

2012/13

2013/14

2014/15

2015/16

2016/17

2017/18

Survey Year

Sources: The Bee Informed Partnership

French for his part, says that he’s seen a huge increase in interest for the honeybee in his time as a beekeeper.

“What we’re seeing is that more people are getting interested in hobby beekeeping,” he says. He said that 10 years ago, when he attended Colorado state beekeeping meetings, he was “the youngest guy in the room” and the only one under 40. Now, he says younger people are getting interested in the practice.

AN ALL-NATURAL ADVERSARY

But beekeepers are still experiencing high annual losses.

French says this is due in large part to the Varroa destructor mite, which — besides having a name like a comic book villain — is one of the honeybees’ greatest foes.

“It is by far the biggest threat to honeybees […] even more than the pesticides,” he says, echoing Seshadri’s claim that pesticides are more of the go-to scapegoat than the primary beekilling agent.

“When commercial beekeepers take their bees to farms, remember, those farmers want those bees there,” French says.

“They’re paying for them. So spraying things to kill them, sure, unintentionally that does happen. But they’re paying for bees to come there. They want to increase production.”

In other words, if farmers’ crops rely on pollination to increase profits and production, and they’re paying beekeepers for their services, it’s in the farmers’ interest to avoid spraying chemicals that could harm honeybees.

The rise in hobby beekeepers, at least on a theoretical level, is a good thing for the honeybee. But because the mite can easily spread from colony to colony, and beekeepers new to the space might not have the same level of knowledge or time to

effectively manage their hives, French worries that an influx of hobbyists may actually increase the Varroa destructor problem.

French describes his treatment plan to halt the mite’s spread as follows: “When I treat my bees, I have some other friends that keep bees in the area. And I always tell them when I’m going to treat and we try and coordinate treatment. So, we kind of hit the whole area at the same time.”

French has been using some of his hives to study the interaction between honeybees and hemp. And he’s not alone.

Seshadri and one of her students, Colton O’Brien, have also been researching hemp and bees to try and set out a plan for responsible pest management in the future. For both parties, the results are promising, although with some substantial caveats.

HEMP & HONEYBEES

It’s a promise that is repeated often throughout our emergent industry: There’s a hope that hemp can help.

In June of 2015, French set out to test how honeybees and hemp would interact. His hypothesis was that encouraging bees to pollinate a field would encourage seed production for hemp plants.

“When people told me that there was a seed shortage and hemp seed was selling for $10,000 a pound or $10 a seed, I was like, this is easy. This is what beekeepers do. We take our bees, we increase productions, and get output on crops,” he explains.

“If I could help increase the seed production by one pound on the field, it definitely over pays for my services.”

French placed 12 hives on 70 acres of hemp being grown for fiber and monitored and reported his results throughout the summer.

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While hemp and honeybees appear to offer each other something that can be mutually beneficial, if new investment money turns hemp into simply another monoculture crop that isn’t releasing pollen, hemp could be part of the problem for honeybees, not a part of the solution.

“The bees love the pollen. They go crazy for it. But cannabis and hemp are naturally nectar-poor, meaning the plant does not produce a lot of nectar for bees,” he says. Bees require nectar to make honey for food, so as a result of the low nectar amounts in the cannabis, French says the bees “pretty much starved to death” by the end of summer. “They couldn’t produce enough honey to sustain themselves,” he says.

For plants that are wind pollinators, such as wheat, rice, and dandelions, this is normal. For commercial beekeepers that ship the hives around the country for pollination services, it simply means supplementing the bees with food — a practice widely used, but which some blame for poor honeybee health.

In other words, honeybees can help hemp farmers increase production, but the bees can’t live solely on hemp.

However, hemp can play a role in helping pollinators, says Seshadri. Her student O’Brien was working in the field, she says, when he noticed an abundance of wild bees and honeybees on flowering hemp plants. His curiosity piqued, he spoke with Seshadri and they decided to set up a study for the following summer to investigate the relationship between bees and hemp.

Their results yielded evidence of a wide variety of pollinators interacting with the hemp, something encouraging despite the lack of nectar produced.

“Male hemp comes to flower around August or September, which is really a crucial time for a lot of pollinators, because they’re kind of heading towards the end of the season,” she explains.

Despite not getting nectar from hemp plants, bees do harvest pollen, which is protein-rich and essential for larva development. During the late summer months in Colorado, very few plants or crops that provide nutrition are in their flowering stage.

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“So that’s what makes hemp really stand out. In Colorado, it fits into the whole agriculture system by providing pollen at that crucial time in the season,” says Seshadri.

For Seshadri, the timeliness of hemp’s flowering stage, combined with the potential of a new crop that we can study before developing pest management strategies, makes the hemp-honeybee relationship an exciting one.

The distinction is, however, that the hemp can’t be feminized in order to provide pollen for the bees. With the unprecedented amount of money flowing into the CBD space post-legalization, it’s a fair bet we’ll see a massive increase in the acreage of hemp planted for CBD this year, which involves female hemp plants producing high-CBD flower instead of male hemp plants releasing pollen.

And therein lies the rub. While hemp and honeybees appear to offer each other something that can be mutually beneficial, if new investment money turns hemp into simply another monoculture crop that isn’t releasing pollen, hemp could be part of the problem for honeybees, not a part of the solution.

When it comes to recognizing and acting on the myriad problems that affect pollinators, the needle is trending in the right way, says Seshadri. But that doesn’t mean we’re in the clear.

“I don’t want anybody to sit back and relax and say, ‘OK, we did our job.’ I don’t want to scare people and say bees are disappearing, but I don’t want to say that everything is okay, just move on,” she says. “I want people to realize that every action we take has a consequence.”

So while there’s hope that hemp can help mitigate some of the issues influencing the honeybee crisis, the plant’s role will be largely a supporting one. Just as a multitude of problems are affecting the bees, like so many legs of a table, a multitude of solutions are needed to save them.

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PLAN A SUMMER HEMP PICNIC! These three recipes can help you host the perfect hemp-inspired picnic, featuring a cheese plate with hemp crackers, a tabbouleh salad, and a berry tartlet for dessert.

R e c i p e a n d P h o t o s by L i z S c h o c h

Picnic season is upon us, and what better way to escape another listless desk lunch or boring indoor dinner than with a picnic? It’s time to turn off the television, cut the charging cord, and plant yourself firmly in the grass with the perfect hemp-inspired menu — and for the adult picnickers, possibly a dry white wine.

PACKING A PROPER PICNIC

Though there are no tiskets or taskets involved, packing a proper picnic basket does take a bit of strategy to ensure your feast is both enjoyable and edible. Don’t forget to include what you’ll need outside of the basket: some oversized cozy blankets and napkins. An extra basket or small crate can be perfect for carrying your goodies, as well as doubling as a tabletop. Pro tip: If you’re picnicking for two, fresh flowers at sunset can do wonders for ambiance.

When dining alfresco, loading up on too many perishables may end your picnic in food poisoning — or at the very least, some funky cheese — if there’s a good gap of time between the food leaving the refrigerator and entering your mouth. To make sure your dinner doesn’t expire before you arrive, use your chilled drinks as cold packs and avoid dishes that can wilt (I’m looking at you, lettuce greens) or melt entirely. Opt for sturdy salads or an assortment of pickled veggies and olives.

Another important note: Dishes are a picnic-goer’s kryptonite. What may seem like an innocent stack of dinner plates at the start of the picnic is a wet sticky mess when it’s time to pack it up and head home. Not to mention the very limited flat surfaces to balance plates and glasses on. Instead, opt for containers that have lids and are easy to snack from.

Plus, a large cutting board or two can double as a steady place to rest a glass of vino.

After you’ve gathered your goods, you may be tempted to tuck a few cold cuts and a bag of chips in your basket and call it a picnic — but why not try something new and nourishing? Break out of the ordinary with some seasonal veggies, fruits, and powerful plant protein. Trust me, your guests and your digestion will thank you.

Crispy Hemp & Flax Crackers Buttery and crisp hemp seed crackers are the perfect addition to an assorted cheese board. These crackers are mild in flavor and can be seasoned with your favorite herbs and spices. Add an extra sprinkling of sea salt, garlic, onion, or dried Italian herbs.

INGREDIENTS — Makes a few dozen crackers

½ cup ground golden flax seeds ½ cup almond flour ¼ cup hulled hemp seeds 2 tbsp butter, softened ½ tsp sea salt ⅓ cup water DIRECTIONS

Heat oven to 300 degrees Fahrenheit and prepare a large baking sheet with parchment or a silicone baking mat.

In a large bowl, mix all of the cracker ingredients until a soft dough forms. It should be slightly wet but it should hold together.

Press the dough onto the prepared baking sheet and cover with cling wrap. Roll the dough to ⅛ of an inch thickness, or use your hands to smooth it as thin as you can. If the dough is sticking, wet your hands with a little water and continue. The thinner the dough, the crisper the cracker will be.

Bake for 20 minutes. Remove from the oven and gently slice into 2 inch squares and bake for an additional 15 minutes, checking frequently to prevent burning. For the best results, separate the crackers after the first bake to allow even crisping. Let cool completely before storing.

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Cucumber Hemp Seed Tabbouleh Fresh cucumber and tomato are a welcome addition to this grain-free tabbouleh.

We swapped the traditional bulgur wheat for the delicately nutty hemp seed for a boost in healthy fats and plant protein. This tabbouleh is sturdy enough to eat solo but perfect for filling lettuce leaves or topping French bread.

INGREDIENTS — Serves 2

⅓ cup water 1 cup hulled hemp seeds 2 cups chopped cucumber 1 cup grape tomatoes, sliced 2 cups fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped 1 cup fresh mint, chopped 2 green onions, finely chopped 1 clove garlic, minced ¼ cup lemon juice 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil Sea salt to taste DIRECTIONS

In a large bowl, combine the hemp seeds, cucumber, tomatoes, garlic, green onions, and chopped herbs. Drizzle with olive oil and lemon juice and toss to coat. Season with sea salt. Serve immediately or store in the refrigerator for up to 3 days.

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Whipped Mascarpone Berry Tartlets with Hemp Seed Crust Sweet and tart berries are the perfect compliment to creamy whipped mascarpone, all piled on a hemp seed shortbread crust.

INGREDIENTS — Makes 4 tartlets

For the crust: 1 cup almond flour 2 tbsp hulled hemp seeds ¼ tsp xanthan gum (option for texture) 2 tbsp sugar 3 tbsp butter 1 tsp cold water For the whipped mascarpone: 8 oz mascarpone cheese 1 tbsp heavy cream 1 tsp vanilla extract 2 tbsp sugar Assorted washed berries

DIRECTIONS

Heat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. To prepare the crust, whisk together almond flour, hemp seeds, xanthan gum (if using), and sugar until combined. Cut the cold butter into the flour mixture with a fork until the mixture looks sandy. Add the cold water and use your hands to form the dough into a ball.

Slice the dough in 4 portions and gently press each portion into the tartlet pans. Bake for 12 minutes or until the crust begins to lightly brown.

While the crust cools, beat the mascarpone cheese, heavy cream, vanilla, and sugar until smooth. Scoop into cooled tartlets and top with fresh berries. Chill for 1 hour before serving. Tartlets can be refrigerated for up to 3 days.

Liz Schoch is a nutritionist who runs the Inspector Gorgeous blog, where she creates plant-based, low-sugar recipes at inspectorgorgeous.com.

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E K U D A L A WINON

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K L A W e h t WALKS

HEMP talks with the renowned activist about her efforts to bring hemp back to the forefront on Native lands, create a post-petroleum economy, and more.

B y J u l i a C l a r k- R i d d e l l P h o t o s by S a r a h L i t t l e R e d f e a t h e r D e s i g n

NOW

is the time for doing, not the time for talking about doing, Winona LaDuke tells me as she drives across South Dakota. The perceived irony of speaking such a statement out loud is not lost on her, nor is the realization that one can multitask: LaDuke is exceptionally good at both talking and doing.

The activist, author, farmer, and two-time vice presidential candidate for the Green Party has spent her decades-long career focused on raising awareness for various causes while trying to implement the solutions she’s fighting for. She helped found the Indigenous Women’s Network in 1985 to support Native women. She founded the White Earth Land Recovery Project in 1989 to buy back land within the White Earth reservation from non-Natives, while restoring traditional food practices. In 1993, she co-founded the Honor the Earth non-profit to raise awareness and funds for Native environmental issues. And she was a water protector at the Standing Rock Dakota Access Pipeline protests in 2016 and 2017, frequently giving interviews to national media outlets about the fight for sovereignty and against fossil fuels.

In essence, LaDuke can walk the walk — but she’s also one of the people who first presented the ideas that everyone else starts talking about before they walk. Right now, LaDuke is working on the creation of a new post-petroleum economy. And she sees hemp as front-and-center in that necessary future.

When I spoke with her this spring, LaDuke had already started planting hemp on her farm, alongside a series of other crops, using horse and human power. Hemp is so important for the post-petroleum economy, LaDuke says, because of its potential to create products like hemp plastic, hempcrete, and hemp textiles that can replace petroleum-based products.

And she’s adamant that Native voices should lead the new post-petroleum economy, which includes the hemp industry. “People should back up,” she says. “We know the right things to do for hemp and that’s what justice looks like.”

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HE M P : So, what are you working on now, as you drive through South Dakota?

Winona LaDuke: Well, my original plan for today was to

speak about hemp in Washington, D.C., but I cancelled going to D.C. It was a nice idea, but I’m in a situation where I can talk about it or I can do it. And right now, I had to do something and not talk about doing something. It’s maple syrup-ing time. My son is harvesting maple syrup for his first time on his own and I wanted to encourage him. Also, I wanted him to do cool. There are a lot of young men out there and we’re trying to encourage them to do cool things.

We also wanted to have time to start some of our hemp plants on our farm. It was just the full moon, and you want to plant during the full moon, so we planted a bunch of CBD hemp this past weekend. We also planted all of our tobacco plants and a bunch of other seeds, because, you know, we grow a lot of plants, not just hemp.

Also, I want to be home and be a part of my family’s life. My family misses me when I’m on the road all of the time.

This is your fourth year growing hemp. How has it been so far and what have you learned along the way about growing hemp compared to other crops?

I’m mostly growing a seed and fiber variety of hemp. I’ve always been interested in fiber because I want to change the textile industry. Right now, the textile industry is so ecologically destructive. I’ve been committed to hemp fiber, and of course, I want to eat the seeds from those fiber plants, too.

In our first year, we had seven hemp growers on the reservation. Now, there’s like 45 and it’s wide open. In the first year, we put in that crop and we started looking around and trying to understand the soils. Then, I inherited the tribal hemp crop, and that is my next challenge. That hemp crop has perennialized and is the happiest crop on the planet.

Perennialized, really? That’s unusual. What it’s like having a perennialized hemp crop, instead of the standard annual crop that’s harvested every fall?

Well, this hemp is for fiber, not for CBD. One of my concerns is that I want not to treat the plant like a slave. The plant needs to be able to reproduce and it has a right to reproduce. When you have fiber hemp, perennializing it means you are less impactful on the soil and you can sequester more carbon by leaving it in the ground longer.

70 64 thehempmag.com

Have you noticed the soil getting healthier through perennializing the crop?

I think it is. I’m trying to understand it more scientifically. I have some theories and I want to do some more research and really pay attention and start documenting the plants’ wellbeing.

You know, the fiber industry is not about competition, it’s about cooperation. We’re going to need people to grow a lot — a lot — of hemp to change the textile industry in this country.

Everyone wants to figure out how to make a lot of money on

CBD, but I’m trying to figure out how to protect Mother Earth, protect our water, protect our soil. I want to learn how to grow different varieties, how to process them… it’s super interesting.

Why do you think it’s important the hemp industry cooperate to grow more hemp?

If hemp can help build soil and sequester carbon, that’s a pretty big thing to be able to do. But also, take for example my home state of Minnesota. Almost everyone has a boat in Minnesota. If we’re going to move to a post-petroleum economy, you’re going to need a whole lot of hemp to get those boats made from hemp plastic instead of regular plastic. That’s not boutique production.

We’re not making doilies here.

Let’s talk more about what you mean when you say the “post-petroleum economy.” You’ve written about how your people, the Anishinaabe people, have a prophecy that “a time will come to choose between two paths, one scorched and one green.”

You’ve said the green path means post-petroleum.

What do you think we need to do as a society to get there?

I could say that we should get our heads out of our asses.

That would be super helpful [laughs].

I can also say that we should just get out of our box. People live in this created world now that exists in one box or another: a cell phone, a car, a house or apartment. We need to be in a bigger picture.

We need to change the transportation system so that it’s not based on rubber on the road. We have to have electric rail. We need to grow organic. We need a hemp economy that is at scale and supporting the ecosystem and the world. We need to get off petroleum plastic, because if you’re going to get off fossil fuels,

Above: Winona LaDuke’s family harvests hemp on her farm in northern Minnesota.

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you need to get off plastics. It’s not too hard, really. There’s like a gazillion ways to do the right thing.

So you’re saying it’s important for us to leave the box, not just stay in the box and paint it green.

Absolutely. I absolutely believe that you have to think systemically. This climate crisis is not an individual problem. It’s not about how I individually am working. It’s about how the system is set up. There’s a lot we can do to achieve the new future, and we have to be the collective.

I’m out here in South Dakota. I’m about to give a speech and put on a dress and get on stage and then I’m going to go out to Pine Ridge and see some relatives and have some prayers and talk to their tribal council about hemp. That’s because people are interested in change. People want to do something that will build the next economy. The Native people have been working on hemp for a long time. Particularly the White Plume family has some blood in this. I’m interested to see how Native people can be at the forefront of the textile hemp economy, and the CBD economy if we’d like as well.

We do good for this plant and we have a lot of land. No one else has the kind of land that we have.

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Massive corporations might have enough land to compete, but you’ve made clear you don’t want them at the forefront.

The hemp economy needs to be led by people who look like you and me. The mess we’re in was created by a bunch of rich white dudes, either in corporations or in the government.

They’ve had their shot and they’ve done poorly. So why would we let them lead the next economy? I’m like, no, thank you, we’re okay!

It’s our plan now to build a hemp textile mill. Right now, I’m wandering around the country and the world and looking at hemp equipment that can be built in a way that is good for communities and good for the environment. I’m really interested in that. But right now, there’s a lot of questions and not too many answers.

Tell us more about your plan for a hemp mill in Minnesota. Are you finding the kind of quality equipment you’re looking for to build the mill?

Let me be clear: I don’t know a lot about textiles, but my grandmother was in the International Ladies’ Garment Workers’ Union, so perhaps it’s in my blood.

Unfortunately, the hemp mills in the USA were decommissioned in the 1940s, which was the last time hemp rope was made in Minnesota. There’s not a lot of knowledge remaining about the technology, so it’s like being a detective trying to figure it out now. We’re looking at milling equipment internationally and we’re looking for people who would want to talk with us about it. We’re doing a lot due diligence, and we’re hopeful that we can build a mill by importing the equipment and working with it in our communities.

One of the last hemp mills was in Winona, Minnesota. Do you think that’s a coincidence?

Nope, I think it’s divine intervention [laughs]. Not really — I’m saying it’s divine intervention and laughing. But, in some ways because of this, I do feel responsible to bring hemp production back to Minnesota.

The last hemp mill was in Winona, Minnesota, so it’s on me.

I’m about to turn 60, and I’m going to have a party in Winona, Minnesota. I’m about to go to Pine Ridge and sniff around for some more Winonas to invite to the party. Winona, in Indian

It seems like quite the challenge to farm at scale without petroleum.

You have to think about the Amish. The thing is, what I’m interested is this question about scale. Because the more energy it takes, the more likely you are to need fossil fuels. So what is the scale where you don’t need fossil fuels? At what level are you at where you’re just one step away from needing fossil fuels?

If you’re trying to feed more people — we have a lot of people — you’re going to need a lot of effort, but of course, we could have more people working on growing crops. I’m also thinking about this question of scale when I’m thinking about the mill. How could we have the mill run on wind power? There’s Class IV wind in Minnesota.

Do you think you’ll be able to build a wind-powered hemp textile mill?

We use the term “windmill” because wind used to power grain mills, and the wind can power a mill, we know that. So can water. But this is where my skill set begins to diminish, because

country, is a name sort of like Joshua. It’s not so unusual.

I think when you turn 60 you should have the ability to do something fabulous. When I’m 60, I’m trying to build a hemp economy [laughs].

I’m not an engineer. It is quite possible. I’m just saying, you can recall from history that we have been able to use wind, water, and horses. We’ve done it before without petroleum and we can do it again.

I’d love to talk about the horses on your farm and how it has been growing hemp with horsepower.

I read your book “Reclaiming the Sacred,” which discusses the ways governments and corporations have interrupted sacred Native practices by controlling land and resources. I was wondering if there are any stories you’ve heard of similar to the stories in that book, about the ways government and corporate projects are impacting land to cultivate hemp?

I have a partner named Chuck who has been working with the horses. He did an inaugural run with the horses. At first, I felt like I was on a chariot riding the horse-powered plow. It’s super fun. I’m looking forward to farming. We’ll have three teams of horses this year we think, which is unheard of. We have three different sizes of horse: small, medium, large. You have to have the right horse.

For example, on a small field, we might use a pony. At some point, you might want to use four big workhorses. It’s going to be fun and I have no idea how it’s all going to happen, but it’s starting to emerge.

I have put in hemp with the horses. I do have a seed drill that can also do that, but I’m trying not to use it. I’m interested in the post-petroleum economy, so I’m trying to do it all without the help of fuel.

I’ll give you an example. My village, aside from the fact that we’re facing the largest pipeline company in the world, which messes with the water in our neck of the woods, has a problem.

My whole village of Pine Point is surrounded by industrial potato farmers. There aren’t too many people growing hemp out there except us, but when those potato guys are spraying pesticides, it’s like, go to hell.

#hempmag 67

We should just get out of our box. People live in this created world now that exists in one box or another: a cell phone, a car, a house or apartment. We need to be in a bigger picture.

— WINONA LADUKE

For decades, you’ve been doing work on the White Earth reservation with heritage seeds, now through your work with the Anishinaabe Agricultural Institute. Why do you think it’s important to be restoring heritage seeds?

When I was an undergraduate at Harvard, my father came to see me one day. He was an old-school Indian guy and he said, “You’re real smart, but I don’t want to hear your voice if you can’t grow corn.” This was in 1980 that my dad said that to me. So I’ve been growing corn since about 1990, and I’ve been growing heritage varieties. I grow corn, beans, squash, Jerusalem artichokes, tobacco, traditional potato varieties, hazelnuts, and then I grow CBD and fiber hemp. I grow a full variety of products and of things, but a lot of our seeds, there wasn’t that many of them left. Our corn varieties are really intelligent and they are adaptable for many weather conditions. I’m a firm believer in agrobiodiversity. It’s what you want if you want

humans to hang out on this planet for another 500,000 years.

We’re going to want agrobiodiversity if you want those things.

So you’re working on preserving those genetics?

Yes, by growing them, but also by feeding the harvest to other people and encouraging other people to grow them.

My hemp interest has to do with the fact that very few people know about the varieties of hemp. There’s a lot of possibility there. Native people deserve to have a research institute that reflects our values, and our values are best promoted by all of us. I want to provide hemp education about varietals, about being able to protect our plant breeds, about what kind of soil conditions promote growth, and those type of things.

To some extent, I’m not sure we’re the people to lead on CBD. I want to be talking about things like hempcrete, like rope making, and learning about hemp processing. I want to grow out all of those things.

Lower left: Winona LaDuke talks with Alex White Plume, former president of the Oglala Sioux Tribe, who first planted hemp 20 years ago.

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I’m super committed to the growth of hemp. I’m interested in how this is going to unfold and I want to be a part of unfolding this in a good way. I’m happy to be here. — W I N O N A L A D U K E

I love farming; I love growing things. It makes me happy.

How much of the time are you on the road? And how much time do you get to be at home working on the farm?

Right now, let’s just say that I’m crowdsourcing for this hemp project. I’m going to speak at a bunch of universities, so I have to go speak to get the money to make my hemp projects come to light. In spring and fall, I go talk to people.

In the summer, when we’re farming, I stay in my territory most of the summer. In the wintertime, I write and I’m with my animals, and I take off and find my friends in the sun.

I’m super committed to the growth of hemp. I’m interested in how this is going to unfold and I want to be a part of unfolding this in a good way. I’m happy to be here.

How are you feeling about hemp legalization so far? Are you feeling pessimistic about the rise of big corporations in the industry, and if you are, what are you doing to cope with it?

My philosophy is that these people should back up. We know the right things to do for hemp, and that’s what justice looks like. The people that were in the bottom of the last economy need to be at the front of the next economy. Tribes are ready to roll. What we need are a lot of people to support us. We need the technical support. Tribes are in a different situation. We have a right to our seeds and a right to our future.

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What are the sort of actions that need to be taken right now in the hemp industry?

I just remember that the plant is not a slave. The plant is a being. Hemp is both male and female, but much of the magic is in the female plant, and we need to respect that plant. During this renaissance, we need to treat this plant as beautiful. I’m really optimistic about this moment. We want the plants to be welcomed. I want to encourage people to be positive and work together, that’s the short of it. We have to be mindful of this magical moment, and we need to think out of the box. Do not get stuck in the box. Our ancestors were guided by the stars, and today, most people need a GPS to get anywhere.

We’re going to make the Green New Deal up here. We’re going to do the “Sitting Bull Plan.” You know, Sitting Bull said many great political things, and in recognition of him and in recognition of the fire that came from Standing Rock, I like to call the Green New Deal the “Sitting Bull Plan.”

He said, “Let us put our minds together to see what kind of future we can make for our children.” That is indeed a profound thing to say, because that’s what it will take — we have to bring our minds together.

We have renewable energy, we have local food, we have agrobiodiversity, we’ve got water. Change is local. It is a woven net of relationships, but it has to be local. No one is going to save you in Washington, so you have to save yourself. And that’s what I’m here doing.

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FIVE BOOKS FOR T H E H E M P LOV E R ’ S L I B R A RY

Gain five new perspectives on the hemp plant and its place in society with these essential reads.

By K . Astre

Hemp has had a good year. Now more than ever, people have begun to appreciate the myriad of hemp’s practical uses, as well as its health and wellness benefits. But there’s still so much to learn about this multifaceted plant. Even if you consider yourself in-the-know, there might be some new (or old!) things that slipped under the radar.

In these five books, you’ll find a broad range of perspectives on hemp, farming, and cultivation — whether you’re interested gaining a deeper understanding of the plant from a sociological, agricultural, radical, or contemporary context. Some were published decades ago and others as recently as last year, but they all offer valuable ways of looking at and learning about hemp, regardless of your level of knowledge.

THE UNSET TLING OF AMERICA BY WENDELL BERRY

Agricultural policy is the focus of this book, which offers a critique on how the emphasis on business has separated humanity from the true meaning of nature. Berry shares his ecological ethics, equating good farming with spirituality, while critiquing agribusiness’s lack of morality. Written in 1977, it offers an eerily accurate depiction of how capitalism’s continued model of creating a disconnection between humanity and the land impacts culture and society as a whole.

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THIS RADICAL LAND BY DAEGAN MILLER

Historian Daegan Miller provides a window into America’s agricultural past through the lens of prominent nineteenth century figures and radical thinkers, including a black antislavery community in the Adirondack wilderness of upstate New York and anarchists in California. This book, published in 2018, is perfect for anyone interested in environmental history with a heavily academic slant that is thoughtful and accessible.

THE ONE-STRAW REVOLUTION: AN INTRODUCTION TO NATURAL FARMING BY MASANOBU FUKUOKA

Masanobu Fukuoka was a trained scientist who studied plant pathology in Japan before he wrote this groundbreaking work on alternative, natural farming. In it, he weaves together his personal philosophy of mirroring nature’s laws for the best results, describing how he believes that the ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops, but the cultivation and perfection of human beings. His “do-nothing” approach offers a new perspective on wasteful work and may inspire a practical approach to revolutionary cultivation.

CULTIVATING FOOD JUSTICE: RACE, CLASS & SUSTAINABILITY EDITED BY ALISON HOPE ALKON

Fans of sustainable agriculture will appreciate this discussion on the intersectionality of the food and social justice movements. This collection of essays offers thought-provoking perspectives and critiques on race, class, and the political and social consequences of whitewashing the food movement.

Looking at production, distribution, and consumption, this book examines how the food industry disproportionately affects Native American, African American, Latinx, and Asian American farmers and farmworkers, as well as the people the food is supposed to reach.

THE EMPEROR WEARS NO CLOTHES BY JACK HERER

“Jack Herer” is more than just the name of a popular and potent cannabis strain; it’s the name of the author of this classic book, first published in 1985. Though decades old, it’s still hailed as a quintessential read for anyone interested in the ins-and-outs of just how useful hemp can be as food, fuel, and beyond. Like the title suggests, it borrows from Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale to paint a picture of the cannabis prohibition of the time.

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from the archives

W H E R E H E M P M E E T S F I N E A RT B y K a t i e Way | P h o t o s by S a r a S o f i a Wa l l a c h

Most of the time, Sara Sofia Wallach fixes her gaze on construction sites, peeling paint, an empty laundromat leaking fluorescent light out into the nighttime, graffiti, and litter. Human figures rarely make up this photographer’s subject matter. Instead, her images focus on the aftermath of human activity, the impact humanity has on the world around us, and the way the world around us retains the signs of our presence even in our absence.

Her work has a pensive, anticipatory quality — the images she captures exude a calm, occasionally languid energy, but still possess a slight precarity. In all of them, change is evidenced by deterioration, mess, or dilapidation.

“I really like the possibility that decay can look beautiful,” Wallach says. “I try to make things in states of decay or forgotten things or trash look like abstract art. That’s

usually how I approach photography.”

Wallach’s images are a testament to the power of framing, and its ability to transform ordinary sights through a shift of perspective. Observers come to understand the topography and composition of a scene she captures through shadows, reflections, or holes in fences — indirect lenses that magnify the character of a setting rather than distorting it. The reflection of spindly tree branches in a body of water; a river or a pond filled with green and yellow leaves, reveals a forest.

This knack for transformation lends itself well to Wallach’s hemp photography, which we featured in our Issue 6 article “Regenerative Farming & the Push for Social Equity at Hudson Hemp.” Instead of encouraging the viewer to appreciate decay, Wallach is instead asking

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Wallach is instead asking the viewer to see a newly legal plant as a work of art, evidence of a changing humanity.

the viewer to see a newly legal plant as a work of art, evidence of a changing humanity.

Wallach has been close with Hudson Hemp’s Melany Dobson for years: Their families vacationed together when the two were growing up, and they attended Bard College together.

So when Dobson and the rest of the Hudson Hemp team found themselves in search of a photographer and documentarian, Wallach was the obvious choice, despite the fact that her past work consisted of artistic rather than commercial photography.

“I was a little nervous at first, because I don’t usually do commercial photography, but Melany just gave me a lot of freedom to approach it in my own way,” Wallach says.

Wallach’s work photographing hemp is just as evocative as her other material. Soft, natural light, men and women at work, lush greenery, and rolling abundance populate the photographs she’s shot on the farm thus far. These images carry the same calming quality found in Wallach’s other collections, a mood that mirrors

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the one she says she was in while taking them. “I was so relaxed the entire time I was out there,” Wallach says, “especially in the fields where the hemp was actually growing.”

The things that draw her to photograph trash, mess, and decay transfer over to her work on the farm, she says, because she views the photography process as a way to give weight to small things.“Yesterday, I was out at Hudson Hemp again and I was taking pictures of a pile of compost,” Wallach says. “I was just thinking, ‘Let’s give the compost the attention that it deserves for doing its job as compost, and helping out in its way.’”

But Wallach says that unlike some of the detritus she regularly she shoots, the picturesque essence of Hudson Hemp lends itself to strong photographs.

“What’s really nice about the hemp farm is that everything is just so naturally beautiful out there,” she says. “I feel like whenever I go out there, it’s just so easy. And I come back with these pictures I’m so happy with, that I’m proud of. It’s really special.”

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PRODUCTS

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1. GLOBE Tracer Classic Skateboard $149.95 / us.globebrand.com

Hemp fun in the summertime.

Celebrate the sunshine with HEMP’s picks for the beach, the backyard, and the boardwalk.

P h o t o s by To d d H e a t h

Made with a gorgeous striped applewood base and fortified with hemp fabric and resin, this skateboard rides like a dream. While a skateboard made from hemp plastic would make a nice freestyle board for tricks, capable of withstanding hard use, this mellow cruiser board highlights sections of hemp fiber as a fashion statement. It’s one of the most deluxe ways to push yourself around town and bring attention to hemp’s beauty. #hempmag 81

2.

3.

2. BugOut Hemp Guitar

Price by request / bugoutguitars.com First and foremost, this guitar is a work of art. Handcrafted by an artisan and musician named Jay in Vermont, the instrument doesn’t produce the most refined sound, but it does highlight the beauty and gorgeous versatility of hemp composites. Jay was inspired to make the hemp guitar after his traditional acoustic guitar started to fall apart on his travels in South America. With a hefty weight and strong body, this guitar can survive any summer adventure you put it through, including white water rafting trips and hikes to mountain summits.

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3. Hempty’s Golf Eco-Friendly HempTees $12.99 for 4 / hemptysgolf.com

You know when people claim that hemp has 50,000 uses and you wonder how that’s even possible? That’s because of nifty little products like this. Golfing can be a notoriously unsustainable sport, from the land use to the cart driving, but with these biodegradable hemp tees, a sunny day on the links gets a little bit greener

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4. Solid Stoney Boardshorts

5. Organic Hemp Rope Hammock

$50 / volcom.com

$89 / rawganique.com

Volcom says these shorts capture “that feeling of reckless abandon usually only a wild night out can bring,” and while we can’t verify that statement, we do know that these stretchy shorts feel soft and supple. Given that the shorts are waterproof, they’re not 100% hemp, but the polyester-cottonhemp-elastane blend is still a step in the right direction.

This hemp rope hammock is made with raw, organic European-grown hemp rope will fit in to whatever natural environment you bring it to. The rope smells as untreated as it is — like a burlap sack — but that is only a testament to how little chemicals were used in its production. Set up the hammock in between some trees in your backyard or bring it with you to a park; either way, you’re going to be swinging with a cleaner conscience.

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6.

7.

$649.00 / hempwickbeeline.com This is truly next-level: a recycled surfboard wrapped with hemp fiber, instead of the standard fiberglass or epoxy. Made to order through a collaboration between the Maui-based hemp company Bee Line Hemp Wick and the Bend, Oregon-based Bixby Surfboards, this surfboard thoroughly impressed the HEMP team. Take it out on the ocean or the river for a smooth surf!

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7. Mountain Mud CBD Sunscreen $29.95 / mountainmudsunscreen.com

CBD can’t do everything, and it can’t protect your skin from harmful UV rays. However, it just might help soothe any inflammation in your skin after it’s been exposed to the sun all day. We particularly approve of the sunscreen’s 100% natural, reef-friendly ingredients — and what this means for protecting our threatened ocean habitats.

PHOTOS COURTESY HEMPWICK BEELINE

6. Hemp Fiber Surfboard

A NEW LOOK AT HEMP CONTACT US FOR CONSULTING APPOINTMENTS 800.280 .6034

| www.sovereignfields.com | info@ sovereignfields.com

Hemp

H I N DS I G HT

For more on ‘Misunderstood’ and more videos about hemp, visit thehempmag.com.

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PHOTO ANDREW MARTIN

Campbell Brewer was driving through northern China between Russia and North Korea, on a film shoot documenting Patagonia’s hemp textile supply chain, when he realized how much the landscape reminded him of farmland in the Midwestern United States.

Brewer began asking questions, “Why did we have to fly all the way across the Pacific Ocean to find the hemp we wanted to shoot, and why is Patagonia sourcing their hemp all the way over here when it seems that the land could be similar?”

In a documentary called “Misunderstood” that his production company, Little Village Films, made with Patagonia, Brewer searches for answers. He gets help from industry leaders, including Winona LaDuke, and reaches a powerful conclusion about the hemp plant’s future. — Robin Kelley

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