Hemp legalization added to Senate farm bill!
WASHINGTON (PNN) - June 7, 2012 - In a last minute addition to the Agriculture Reform, Food and Jobs Act of 2012, Senator Ron Wyden (Ore.) has submitted an amendment that would legalize the production of industrial hemp, a potential new bumper crop for Fascist Police States of Amerika farmers.
“Industrial hemp is used in many healthy and sustainable consumer products. However, the federal prohibition on growing industrial hemp has forced companies to needlessly import raw materials from other countries,” said Wyden in a prepared statement. “My amendment will allow farmers to produce hemp for these safe and legitimate products right here.”
Allowing farmers to produce industrial hemp would yield significant and immediate profits the first year, according to an analysis conducted in 1998 by the Center for Business and Economic Research at the University of Kentucky.
Researchers found that farmers in the state of Kentucky alone could see $220-$605 in net profits per acre of hemp. Adjusted for inflation using the consumer price index, those 1998 dollars would actually be worth $310-$854 today, although the study’s authors note that variables in supply and demand for hemp could change that valuation.
It’s not clear if the bill has a shot, however. Conservative groups like the Club for Growth are urging Senators to vote against the farm bill, which is under consideration this week, because it has too many attachments unrelated to the agricultural sectors.
The bill’s sponsor, Senator Debbie Stabenow (Mich.), has also called on other Senators to stop adding unrelated amendments, which the Senate spent much of Wednesday doing. If the Senate’s top partisans cannot find an agreeable solution to limiting the bill’s amendments, it is likely to languish and die.
Bills seeking to legalize industrial hemp have cleared at least one legislative chamber in 17 states, including Maine, Montana, North Dakota, Oregon, Vermont and West Virginia, where those bills became law. Scientists say the psychoactive component of marijuana is almost completely undetectable in hemp.
