2013 starts well for hemp

This year is starting well, with a petition now up at www.minwear.com/about-us/ - and really concerned people signing. Greta Gaines, Cynthia McKinney, Dave Pillar, Dave Brooks - we have a long way to go though. What is interesting to watch is what states they are coming from. All 50 states have a signer now, with the the largest numbers being Texas, Colorado, Kentucky, Tennessee, Florida and California. These are the states whose legislators - Ron Paul, Rand Paul for instance (TX/KY) have been out there for the issue - and whose citizens are the most aware.

From Kentuckians we get the most activism, and there are plans for a Kentucky Hemp Museum tour in the near future, to go to some of the aforementioned states.

It can be said that the curren movement started in California - where Jack Herer was based, although he got his facts from Jack Frazier on the East Coast. Frazier's book is one of the best books on hemp - and rather hard to find now. Herer's has sold millions of copies and is rather more into the smoking side of things.

Whatever his enthusiasm for the THC varieities, Herer did wake up millions of people to the hemp issue, and his state has more hemp businesses than any other. (Minawear, though now based in Texas, started in Santa Monica, California). One of these is Nutiva, run by John Roulac, of which I was reminded when I went to buy hemp oil at Whole Foods today. Strangely, they did not stack hemp oil among the many oils they had - but Whole Body did. They no longer had Good Oil, good riddance as that particular brand, as I have noted on this blog, used chemical defoliants - and had upgraded to Nutiva and Manitoba Hemp Harvest.

One might assume I was buying it for food, and while not wrong this logic, I was actually buying it as a drying oil for my paintings.  (Previous posts have noted its qualities and the chemical reactions of oxidation of painting oils). Most I will consume myself - and with that in mind, it seems worth posting the nutritional value of that brand of hemp oil:

Omega-3LA             2.5gm     per Tbsp
Omega-6LA              7gm       per Tbsp
Omega-9LA              2.5gm    per Tbsp
Omega-3 SDA           250mg
GLA                          500mg    per Tbsp
Calories                      125        per Tbsp
Saturated fat                1gm     per Tbsp
Trans Fat                     0gm     per Tbsp
Poylunsaturated Fat   11gm   per Tbsp
Monounsaturated Fat  2gm    per Tbsp
Cholesterol                    0gm    per Tbsp
Sodium                          0gm     per Tbsp

www.nutiva.com

VEGAN GOODIES

Yesterday the Vegan Fest in London was packed as usual. The talk got under way at 1pm, introduced by Sagar. After some historical remarks about hemp, we then got to the core of the issue, nutrition. Samples of many products were at this point handed out, including the very packs seen to the left - these also came in chocolate and plain. Nutiva had kindly sent these all the way from California, and a Canadian company, Vega, also sent in supplies. No one went hungry, but there were a few unhappy souls who did not quite take kindly to us spilling the beans on soya, which was a feature in the Ecologist. As is often the case, there are people who ask inane questions about the facts, but refuse to read or listen. The Ecologist had also given us a supply of their magazines, which the diehard soya lovers refused to read! Most, however, were happy to have such a good magazine in their hands. A small point made by one of the audience members was that the Good Oil packs had salmon recipes on them, yes, that was just the way Good Oil is, and the owner, Henry Braham, who lives a short walk away from the fest, did not bother to show up - he was off in his 4x4! Not quite the way to go for anyone in the hemp business. We have been trying for years to convince him not to use defoliants on the leaves when he harvests, but he is not one for answering emails or returning calls. Oh well. I can recommend here Hemp Foods for You instead, run by Paul Dean in Glastonbury. He presses his seeds 24 hours before delivery and uses a cold stone. And needless to say, 4x4s are not his means of transport.

But getting back to the controversy, it looks like it upset not just the soya fans at a vegan fest, but the bigwigs in the soya industry are upset too, and are pulling strings behind the scenes to keep other journalists off the story. This is where the Ecologist really shines, it does not have ads for 4x4s and it does not give in to such pressure. Sadly, the press is mostly just a whore for the rich 4x4 driving types, and the little that filters through is but a fraction of the crucial information we need to be getting. The soya issue is one of the most important stories that can be printed, yet it may get lost due to journalistic cowardice. We may see a press blackout on this issue, so it is good to be able to shine some light on this while we can.

Thanks to all the hemp companies that made this happen, those mentioned already and also Sativa Bags, Minawear, Rocky Mountain Grain Products, The Hemp Shop, C-Iced Tea, and Innocent Oils.

THE NEW GREEN

The Economist states that 'weed' is the 'new green'. As hemp gains momentum in the US with Dave Monson's lawsuit (see previous post), journalists are taking a look. The only people not taking a look are the politicians who are trying to keep hemp illegal, and some of the so-called green activists who still think hemp is dope, or are swayed by too many George Monbiot opinions to think realistically. Business-wise hemp is certainly on the rise, the article quotes John Roulac of Nutiva as saying that sales went from less than $1m to $4.5 in 3 years. Other companies in his state, such as Minawear and GeoMio, are also seeing an increase in sales (both of these companies merged in January this year).

The fight to be seen as green has extended itself into fashion and the media, where stars do some silly things just to be seen with something green - Cheryl Crow weighed in by saying we ought to only use one square of toilet paper. My advice is don't shake her hand, it may not be very green. Other not very green personalities are those running around with cotton bags trying to look cool in a bag that cost some third world town their water supply, but the media does not seem to care about such trivial facts as these in their pursuit of celebrities to worship.

The way things are going we might even expect to have a book on the environment written by Paris Hilton, and as she has lots of spare time on her hands (and free room and board in a 5 star hotel courtesy of the taxpayer) this might just be the case. If she hasn't, Cameron Diaz has, so look for her book, titled Green, to hit the stands next week. How many trees were chopped down to print it though, and did she bother to use any hemp paper? If it's any good I'd like to know, but if not, maybe chop it up and sent it to Cheryl Crow to use in her loo. That's called recycling.

As to bags, I have just seen the Minawear design, and they are way too cool to waste on Mss. Crow or Hilton. Ms. Diaz, after sporting a Shining Path mantra on her bag last week in Peru, which some journalists said was like wearing a swastika at the Wailing Wall, may not be a candidate for one either. Since California is banning the plastic bag in 2008, there is a bag war in progress in which lots of fly-by-night eco-companies try to get us to use cotton bags or, in the case of the Onya people, polyester bags. The real environmentalists will carry hemp, and better if it is left undyed, why use more chemicals? Elegant simplicity is about to arrive in Hollywood from designer Mina Hegaard. This will be the sensation of the summer. The new green is a natural hemp bag.