HEMP IN KANSAS

The following is from Debby Moore of the Hemp Industries Association in Kansas to her local paper:

December 14, 2009 - 10:00pm
I enjoyed reading George Will's recent column on medical marijuana and have asked my local planning department where it would zone property for medical marijuana dispensaries.
Cannabis Sativa L. Hemp has been documented as medicine for more than 2,000 years. The slang name, marijuana, was introduced in the early 1930s.
I personally hope the state will stand up and change its laws regulating cannabis. Legalization of cannabis would provide enormous agri-business advantages for Kansas, one of the states chosen by the federal government to grow hemp for the World War II Hemp For Victory campaign.
Hemp once was so vital in the Kansas economy that when the Capitol was constructed in Topeka, hemp leaves were painted around the murals at the top of the rotunda.
Should Kansas engage in economic development of cannabis hemp, the profits of the labors produced from cultivating this plant would stay in the state. Kansas could grow its own protein, paper, fiber and fuel. The state would not need to import these raw fiber resources.
Other countries build shipping crates, fiber board for building supplies, solvents to restore centuries-old wood framing and plastics for the automobile industry from their hemp crops.
Why not Kansas?
DEBBY MOORE,
director of research,
Hemp Industries of Kansas,

Wichita