Cannabis sativa--aka pot, marijuana, weed, hemp, etc. I'm pretty sure every college student has heard of this plant by one name or another. What you might not know is that Cannabis sativa is genetically changing into what horticulturists want to call two different plants, one with a multitude of leaves and buds and a high presence of THC (Tetrahydrocannabinol), and one with long stalks, few leaves, and practically no trace of THC. In simple terms--one you can smoke, and one you can't. (If you wanna get technical, you can smoke the second one, you just won't get a high off of it.)
So why am I talking about pot? Good question. One of the past lectures in my horticulture class was based on this plant. (And yes, marijuana is a plant. I had someone come up to me and tell me that pot wasn't a plant, it's a drug. Yeah.) Hemp used to be used to make fabric for clothing and sails, to make rope, cordage, and paper. Presidents Washington and Jefferson both grew hemp on their farms. Here's a fun fact: The Declaration of Independence was drafted on hemp paper.
Until the 1890’s, the US made most paper from hemp, not trees. Hemp is actually a more environmentally friendly source of paper as it takes about 1 acre of hemp to produce as much paper as 4 acres of trees. Hemp does not contain as much lignin as wood and so it can be pulped without chlorine bleaching and the resulting dioxin byproducts that manufacturing wood paper produces. Hemp paper can be recycled more times than wood/paper. In the 1980's, researchers developed an enzymatic process enabling hemp to be spun into fine textiles for apparel.
Hemp also grows fast, can be grown in cooler climates than cotton, replenishes the soil it grows in, and produces three times more fabric per acre than cotton. Hemp plants have anti- microbial properties, so they are not very susceptible to pests and do not have to rely on pesticides, fertilizers, or herbicides to grow. Hemp’s dense growth habit crowds out weeds, making it a great candidate for organic farming. People attempting to grow THC laden marijuana wouldn't want to grow their crop within a field of hemp, due to the cross-pollination that would occur between the plants, possibly damaging their crop.
So, altogether, the growth of hemp (just to be clear, marijuana is used as a drug, hemp has less than 1% THC. You'd have better luck getting high smoking your mom's pansies. I don't suggest that, though) seems to be an affective way of reducing our ecological footprint. A plant that can save trees, reduce carbon dioxide, provide for the textile industry, is more efficient than cotton plants, requires no fertilizers or pesticides, and is native to Ohio? Yet government officials still refuse to legalize the growth of hemp. Because pot is pot. Even if you're more likely to get a headache than a high smoking it. For more info, go to http://votehemp.com
