THE LAND OF LINCOLN SAYS NO TO HEMP

The GOP's first president came from a hemp growing state: Illinois. His father-in-law was a Southern plantation owner who grew hemp. The same party today is against hemp; it is not new information to most of you that the Founding Fathers grew hemp. The former president, what would he think? But more importantly, the present president, also from Illinois, what is he doing about it? Nothing. Both parties (the present POTUS is a Democrat) have little to offer the US, which is sowing more and more cotton which dries up the water supply.

And while they filibuster, we lose. Illinois last week voted against the legalisation of hemp, joining the ranks of South Dakota, California and Vermont. In contrast to this, Canada, China and all of the EU countries can grow it.

This week I got email from two people in Uganda about growing it, and they are now in touch. Hopefully they will be able to get the seeds they need, and line up a buyer - there are hemp shops in South Africa, where the legality of growing hemp is a grey area. It would be ironic if the next jar of hemp seed oil sold in Illinois is grown in Uganda...just now what they buy is mostly Canadian. But, if US legislators would act more like Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln, whose faces are on the currency that is actually made with hemp - Illinois could be raising a cash crop. It's sad...what can we do?

WHERE'S THE HEMP?

On 7/7/7, a group of foul-mouthed millionaires assembled to get attention and burn up lots of petrol whilst telling us not to burn up lots of petrol. It was called "Live Earth", but run as it was by idiots, I thought the Gaia was gonna die right then and there, on the 2-year anniversary of the London bombings. Somehow we survived this made-for-TV hypocrisy. Those of us who did are now questioning why hemp was not once mentioned on this, in fact I just got a good essay from Doug Yurchey about this, it may or may not be up yet on his site, http://www.yurchey.com/

Above is the image of Ruth's hemp bar, I'm sure your Senators and Congressmen (and women) are gonna love it like apple pie, and so will their dear old mom, so why not send them a bar? Ruth was instrumental in getting hemp legalised in Canada in 1998, and her site is http://www.ruthshempfoods.com/

Americans are now fighting for hemp, led by David Monson, a lawmaker from North Dakota (who is probably eating a Ruth's bar as you read).

Lately I've been getting requests from Africa about hemp paper, one fast food company in South Africa wants to switch to hemp as wood is getting scarce, and a company in Eritrea also wants to start production. The scarcity of trees is affecting Ugandan papermakers so much that they now have to transport wood pulp 200 miles, and they too are thinking of getting some hemp in the ground. They also recently made plastic bags illegal in that country, but the sad thing is that idiots like Al the Bore are now just gonna go out and get more cotton cultivated so they can grow it for their cotton shopping bags, which may or may not be made by Anya Hindmarch and others impervious to the fact that cotton depletes the water where it is grown. And as this is in some poor part of the world where Al and Anya do not live (or Mad Onna), and they do not fly in to do Live Earth attention stunts, it does not matter.

But some good news is in order, hemp bags are catching on, The Ecologist has a reader offer on hemp bags made by The Hemp Shop and Minawear in California will have much the same bags on sale for Americans. They are large enough to hold a good bit of shopping including those Ruth's hemp bars with the red, white and blue wrappers.

UGANDA GOES BANANAS

There is the war on drugs and the everlasting war on terror, but the really big war is the bag war. This may look like a terrorist to the right (if you believe all the CIA propaganda and excuses for napalming anyone they like), or just a child with a large hat, but in fact this is the latest eco-warrior. Uganda has made plastic bags illegal, so anyone with a plastic bag (and this includes the Onya bag) is now a criminal (at least in Uganda). So what are they using? Well, while they await the hemp bags made by Bobby Pugh at The Hemp Shop in the UK, they are using banana leaves. Not sure if the leaf thing will quite catch on in London or LA, but it does seem to work well in certain areas.

Of course, the idea may be too good as going green and using leaves may threaten the profits of large multinational corporations, which may lead to Uganda being bombed in retaliation on some excuse or another. Wait for the NSA to force them all to use plastic bags or claim that banana leaves are a dangerous drug and need to be wiped out, as they did with hemp. Uganda and all banana republics be forewarned, George Bush is watching you!

HEMP SUMMIT IN LONDON

Wednesday, 31 May 2006 was the kick-off of a series of meetings on
hemp. Jane Taylor of Positive News brought together a number of people with
an interest in and knowledge of hemp. Tim Nimmo, in whose house the
meeting was held, is currently growing a crop of hemp in Kenya, now six weeks into
its cycle. Tim’s aim is to get hemp integrated into the national economy
and to reduce pollution. As Kenya consumes large quantities of charcoal, the
use of hemp for this would provide a necessary product while reducing the amount of deforestation currently taking place in the pursuit of wood for charcoal.
The hemp plant, however, provides much more valuable products than
charcoal, so he is looking into harvesting hemp for seed and possibly fibre as
well.

In his area sisal is a major crop, with 43,000 acres under cultivation.
As the price of sisal has been falling lately due to competition from synthetic fibres, the sisal plantation owners have been also looking into hemp as an alternative crop. Sisal has at times been referred to as hemp, but is a very different plant altogether, being a perennial monocot, mainly suited to arid regions; hemp is an annual dicot, usually harvested in 90-100 days.
One concern with growing hemp in many parts of Kenya is irrigation.

This issue and others will be studied by Tim, who is taking back to Kenya a
copy of The Cultivation of Hemp by Dr. Ivan Bocsa and Michael Karus.
As the issue of raising hemp in Africa was one of the main themes at
the summit, it was appropriate to have Chris Sanders of the Cannabis
Coalition (UK) on hand. Chris has been developing an idea of promoting a hemp aid
event, having spent the last year researching the legality of hemp
cultivation in Africa. It appears that many countries do not allow this
plant or are unwilling to discuss it. It is known that hemp for
marijuana is grown in many places, thus it would stand to reason that hemp as an
industrial plant could also be grown.

There have been field trials conducted by the government of South Africa
some years ago, but their interest seems to have dwindled. Chris found
that they had purchased a number of German machines for processing hemp,
but that the present whereabouts of these machines are unknown.
Marc Deeley and Sam Heslop both wrote theses on hemp and the environment
in the late 1990s, and they were able to contribute much in the way of
figures relative to hemp’s ecological value. Part of the plan in cultivating
hemp in Africa is a carbon neutrality payment, for which there needs to be
information about the amount of carbon and carbon dioxide that hemp
takes from the atmosphere.

Vedora, a farmer from Uganda, spoke on the feasibility of growing hemp
in that nation, where he has been given access to 300 square miles of land
near Lake Victoria. He discussed the possible uses of hemp in his part of
the world. Like Tim, he saw it as a supplier of charcoal, and had already
in his possession a mobile device for converting cellulose to charcoal. A
discussion of the sale of the other parts of the plant included seed
and oil, with the cake from the pressing most likely being used to feed
cattle.

It was advised that he peel the outer bark for paper pulp, a
possibility in his case as he is near a large paper mill. While it may not process
100% hemp pulp, it may well be that a hemp blend could be developed. With a
ready market for this in the West, he could create an export. It was
mentioned that elephants do not eat hemp, a positive factor for African farmers
as these creatures do quite a lot of harm to other crops.

From the advertising world Simon Gargette sat in, taking notes with a
view to the promotion of hemp events in the future. Carlo and Rebekita, also
involved in public relations projects, came along with much the same
purpose. Their expertise will be needed in the creation of events and
awareness. Most of the speakers are from or reside in the UK, and so a
discussion of Hempcore and its policies was much to be expected.
Basically, this company has the monopoly on seed sales in the UK, where
individuals must obtain a Home Office licence in order to grow hemp. Hempcore
provides just over a dozen approved varieties of seeds, but there is demand for
varieties not on the list. As this was not of immediate use to Tim or
Vedora, the issue of procuring seeds turned to international seedbanks,
with Kenyon Gibson giving information on where to acquire seed. Much is
currently produced in the Soviet Union and the Ukraine, but there is a new firm,
Ecofibres, in Australia, which is working on seed varieties; being
closer to Africa in climate, they may be more inclined to produce drought
resistant varieties. Also present was Joe Mellen, a long-time ecological
activist, and Cindy Mackintosh, a co-author with Kenyon of the historical monograph,
Hemp for Victory: History and Qualities of the World’s Most Useful Plant. (She and her husaband Nick have helped this work along over the years and have made its publication possible by forming Whitaker Publishing).

While this information comes just as Hemp for Victory rolls off the
press, it will not be included in that work, but is certainly a chapter in
hemp history. Hemp projects in Africa are especially welcome, and any
information relative to hemp farming on that continent and/or hemp
cultivation in arid lands would be welcome. The next meeting is
tentatively scheduled for 28 June, 2006 in London, the exact venue TBD.

For further information on Hemp Aid/Hemp in Africa please contact
Kenyon Gibson at: cannabissatival@hotmail.com