by: Mason Gentry
On Friday of last week, Parkland facilitated a discussion on hemp farming with the Champaign County Farm Bureau in the Tony Noel Agricultural Technology Applications Center. In attendance were three special speakers, Bill Bodine and Mike Doherty with the Illinois Farm Bureau and Stacy McCaskill with the Illinois Small Business Development Centers (SBDC). There to listen were 47 audience members who were interested in the history of hemp and its implementation in our legal system and economy. This new commodity has just as many uses as it does raise questions; these community members were simply starting the conversation.
What many people may not know is that hemp has played a large role in United States history. In her presentation materials for the hemp discussion, McCaskill provided a lengthy list of historical facts about hemp. One of these facts is that in the 1700s, many colonists were required by law to grow hemp, alluding to its vast amount of uses. The founding fathers recognized their uses and in 1776 and drafted the Declaration of Independence on hemp paper. For almost two centuries, Americans took advantage of hemp as it allowed for at least 25,000 different products and can be made 10 times stronger than steel. However, it all came to a screeching halt in 1970 when the Controlled Substance Act included hemp as a Schedule I narcotic changing the course of the plant for almost 50 years, according to McCaskill. With new legislation being made to accommodate hemp and its uses, the U.S. aims to rejuvenate the practice of growing hemp.
Jessie McClusky-Gilbert, a Parkland program manager of Community Education and the coordinator for last week’s hemp discussion, explained that the level of education required to begin the growth of hemp in Illinois made Parkland College an appropriate setting. The first topic discussed in the meeting was how the state of Illinois and, more broadly, the United States will regulate the popular crop. According to the Illinois Department of Agriculture, both hemp and marijuana are Cannabis sativa L. Although the plants are very similar in classification, they are much different as “it‘s not marijuana—its hemp which we can use,” said McClusky-Gilbert. Industrial hemp has less than 0.3% tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the chemical responsible for the mind alteration in marijuana, according to the Illinois Department of Agriculture.
After the Industrial Hemp Act of 2018 was enacted, all states were able to regulate hemp on their own terms. In his presentation, Bodine wrote that in Illinois, the regulations that must be met are the name and address of the person, type of business or organization they wish to grow under, legal description of the land including GPS coordinates, a map of the area, the varieties of the plant intended to be farmed and a $100 application fee. Within 30 days the IDOA will either approve or deny the request.
“This is an exciting opportunity to have and the community is interested, but we still have a lot of questions.”
The regulations are quite hefty but using a safe approach to this high risk-market could produce a gold mine of opportunities. McCulsky-Gilbert is hopeful of the business ventures and markets the plant will open. She is supportive of furthering education to help grow the new potential commodity as she strives to help people start businesses and completely embraces learning about hemp and all its uses.
With this meeting at Parkland in the books, we are one step closer to eliminating the curtain of questions that surround the growth of hemp. It is important to remember that, “This is an exciting opportunity to have and the community is interested, but we still have a lot of questions,” McClusky-Gilbert said. The community seems to be prepared to learn about hemp, how to regulate it, and what its uses are on the market. All that is left is the implementation of proper regulations as well as agricultural and business practices to see the learning process through.
