Hemp, a form of cannabis, to become legal with Trump's signature on Farm Bill
DENVER -- Prepare to see more hemp beer, food, supplements and clothing if President Donald Trump signs the new Farm Bill that would more broadly permit American farmers to grow hemp, which has long been restricted due to its ties to marijuana.
Hemp plants are the same species as marijuana but contain virtually none of the psychoactive compounds that get people high. While hemp fibers have long been prized for their durability and use in clothing and paper, the plant is increasingly used to make food and other dietary supplements containing CBD, a cannabis derivative that boosters say has important health benefits.
The $867 billion Farm Bill clarifies that hemp will be treated as an agricultural product, allowing growers to qualify for crop insurance and research grants. It also sets the stage for broader availability of hemp-based foods and supplements by removing the plant from the Controlled Substances Act. Farmers in Colorado produce about half of all the hemp grown in the United States, in part thanks to the state's 2014 legalization of cannabis.
"It's been long overdue," said state Sen. Kerry Donovan, a Democrat who chairs the Colorado Senate's Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Energy Committee. "I can't wait to see the president put pen to paper and make this final."
You can already buy hemp dog treats, hemp-infused beer and hemp lotion, and advocates say the Farm Bill will unleash broader cultivation and processing nationally.
In Colorado, New Belgium Brewing, which makes the nationally available "The Hemperor HPA," plans to explore using hemp flowers in new beers. Under current law, The Hemperor can only be made with seeds and stems.
The clothing and outdoor gear company Patagonia, which already makes hemp-based clothing using imported fibers, plans to increase its use of American-grown hemp. "We look forward to buying hemp from Colorado and the United States to sell in our stores," said Mark Stevens, one of the company's district environmental coordinators.
Hemp advocates held a press conference in Denver Thursday to tout the expected legalization and thank Trump in advance for signing the bill. The president is expected to sign the bill next week.
The Hemp Business Journal estimates at least $820 million in hemp products were sold in the U.S. in 2017, and will rise to $1.9 billion by 2022. Because there's no large-scale hemp cultivation in the U.S. today, hemp products sold here are primarily made from seeds harvested in Canada, Europe and China, according to federal officials. Canada supplies about 90 percent of the hemp products sold in the United States.
In the U.S., some states have permitted small-scale hemp production, with Colorado home to the largest annual crop, followed by Kentucky. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, a Republican who represents Kentucky, backed the Farm Bill's change because he hopes tobacco farmers can switch to growing hemp.
McConnell signed the Senate version of the bill with a hemp pen, and offered to let the president use it to sign the law into effect. McConnell in 2014 helped pass a pilot program to let Colorado and Kentucky, among other states, experiment with state-regulated hemp farming.
"At a time when farm income is down and growers are struggling, industrial hemp is a bright spot of agriculture’s future," McConnell wrote on Twitter this week.
In a statement, the anti-marijuana group Smart Approaches to Marijuana said it worries the Farm Bill's language is too permissive, and would have preferred to see the law allow only what it called "true" industrial hemp: stalks, fibers and seeds.
"Because the language effectively legalizes small amounts of THC derived from hemp (and legalizes all other cannabinoids and extracts), it may have negative implications for compliance with international drug control treaties, sales of adulterated food products, and drug testing for marijuana," SAM said.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Hemp, a form of cannabis, to become legal with Trump's signature on Farm Bill
