Hi Jo,
I have always advocated that hemp is used instead of cotton to conserve the soil.

I thought it was being grown in Tasmania to test the idea out . Thanks for the information

An interesting aspect of the sugar industry (or what is left of it after so much has been sold off) is that it is carbon neutral. The CO2 produced in the manufacture of sugar crystal, is balanced by the intake of CO2 by the sugar cane plant.

Many sugar mills are (or were before they were sold) carrying out cogeneration, with some mills also developing compositing of mill waste products.

The sugar industry is (or was) one of the green industries in Australia, but there has also been investigation for some years into whether to grow sugar cane or hemp on the same soil.

If varieties of hemp do supply their own nitrogen through nitrogen-fixing root rhizobium, then this is a definite advantage over sugar cane, as nitrogen fertiliser is a major cost to sugar cane farmers.

nitrogen fertiliser is the elephant in the room
[one third of it turns into nitrous oxide]
100 times worse than c02..!

hemp needs no nitrogen
if one tenth of the area harvested of trees..last year alone
was cropped with hemp..it can replace all the woodchip paper

it is a multicrop..[the leaves are fertiliser]
the stem is fibre...containing a core bast
that can be cheaply made into ethonol

makes light weight concrete[replacing the rocks]...ie reduces its weight..so heavey buildings dont fall down and hurt people

it can be processed locally into 30,000 different products
it cures cancer..heals arthritus..and has many other uses
from anticlotting blood..to widening arteries after strokes
[hence the red eyes]

it is the tree of life [rev 22]
it is the base for a native monetry syastem
[where the promise note promises the seds..by weight

[just like pounds shillings pence and dollar were weights in silver
pre the federal reserve banks looting it from the treasuries]

if we replaced cotten farming[and rice farming with hemp
we would produce more fibre..AND more food...and more jobs locally

but big petro..dont want it
monsanto dfont want it
the medical[stroke medication indutry],,dont want it

etc etc
even lawyers dont want it
cause drug guilty pleas are employing 3 out of 5 lawyers

ITS A PLANT
not a drug

its not addictive
cause its fat solable
thus GRADUALLY leaves the body
and thus no withdrawel 'symptoms'

further..it refutes the links to phycosis
see the facts are 2 out of 100 users..will get phycosis
BUT...of NON users..4 out of 100..will get phycosis

this law is the crime
stop thinking nitrous oxide isnt a grenhouse gas
[as is methane]..noting they dont get taxed..lol

Leigh's article should be read with at least the following article open for ready reference to evaluate each and every one of his claims.

I normally wouldn't spoon feed it but hempophiles seem incapable of googling the words "hemp tasmania growing notes". Then there's a fair bit of back of the envelope translating; which when done correctly will indicate Leigh's possibly pathological tendency to inflate the potential of hemp.

http://www.dpiw.tas.gov.au/inter,nsf/WebPages/TTAR-5R86BK?open

It comes from Tasmanian DPI and they too try to adopt a positive tone by leading with the most optimistic one-percentiles. However at least they were aware of their responsibility to not mislead the public so they presented ranges and means as well; the reader should pay more attention to these before parting with their hard-earned cash or incredulity.

I'll call in later and see how everyone's doing.

Anyonbe who'e marked student term papers knows that hyperbole may well be paraphrased plagiarism, traceable by a simple search on a phrase. And guess what? David’s peniultimate paragraph was paraphrased from some French kid’s school project.

David Leigh: “Growing hemp instead of clear-felling forests or plantations is a much better way of fulfilling the need for fibre. As an example, one-hectare of hemp will produce as much quality paper as 4.1 hectares of trees and can be grown in 90 days (a business cycle) rather than twenty five years. The harvesting and processing is far less energy intensive and does not require harsh chemical use.”

So I googled “HEMP 4.1 HECTARES OF TREES", and came up with the following student project presented on a green background lavishly festooned with rainbow decorations...

http://iml.jou.ufl.edu/projects/students/Marques/PRODUCT.HTM
Hemp Production

French Student (FS):

“…It is suggested by one source *(infotank) that hemp paper can save the forests. "One acre of cannabis hemp, in annual rotation over a twenty year period would produce as much pulp for paper as 4.1 acres of trees being cut down over the same 20 year period." Hemp is a very renewable plant. It only takes one year for a hemp plant to reach full growth and to be harvested. This source claims that making paper from hemp uses 1/5 to 1/7 as much polluting chemicals and does not use chlorine bleach, a chemical commonly used to produce paper from trees…”

Ok Let’s look at the source, ‘infotank’. In the student’s paper, Under references, I eventually find:

Facts About Hemp http://www.infotank.com/Hemp/Facts.html

Drumroll…..

Tadah! 404 - File or directory not found. The resource you are looking for might have been removed, had its name changed, or is temporarily unavailable.

Contd/

contd…

Don’t believe it? Line by line:

(1) Student: “It is suggested by one source *(infotank) that hemp paper can save the forests”

Leigh “Growing hemp instead of clear-felling forests or plantations is a much better way of fulfilling the need for fibre.
Close, but is it paraphrasing?

(2) Student: One acre of cannabis hemp, in annual rotation over a twenty year period would produce as much pulp for paper as 4.1 acres of trees being cut down over the same 20 year period."

Leigh: As an example, one-hectare of hemp will produce as much quality paper as 4.1 hectares of trees and can be grown in 90 days (a business cycle) rather than twenty five years.
Looks like global replace of acre with hectare leavened with added beef ordure.

(3) Student: This source claims that making paper from hemp uses 1/5 to 1/7 as much polluting chemicals and does not use chlorine bleach, a chemical commonly used to produce paper from trees…”

Leigh: The harvesting and processing is far less energy intensive and does not require harsh chemical use.”
The man has a talent of sorts.

Summary: Plagiarised/paraphrased and unacknowledged source, and that source's source not checked.

Grade: F minus.

Seeing as hemp
-is a weed and has little trouble propogating
-can handle growing in extreme conditions, including inside the house of a neglectful tennant
-Needs very little water
-can be converted into very durable paper, fabric and even hard-surface material
-Is very obviously flammable and would make a good substitute for kindling
-and what many people don't know, is that it has little value as a narcotic save for the specific strains that are used for smoking (and even among those- hardly any have any potent effects).

We are insane not to drastically expand on it as a legitimate industry- as we are clearly in no position to be able to accommodate cotton farming and wood-based paper anymore.

We've investigated growing hemp on some of our company's buffer land, not so much as a carbon sink, but more for replacing our forage crops we use to make mulch hay for rehabilitating disturbed ground. It's one of those typical 'weeds' that will grow easily, but to produce a significantly dense crop is very difficult and in our case will require irrigation. Still keen to continue trials, but keep in mind there is no such thing as a plant that can just be dropped anywhere and 'hey presto' it's a dense forest. Temperature and water influence hemp as much as any other plant. It's easy to get carried away with it being a cure all.

I know its old history, but hemp was chased into the drug register by the emerging synthetic products early last century. DuPont's nylon is usually cast as the main villain in this story. Think nylon stockings and nylon rope, and ask yourself if WWII could have been won without either?
Today it is emerging as a viable fabric, especially when blended with cotton. Various products are appearing from jeans to t-shirts, from underwear to evening wear. It's not as fine as the old finest cotton or the new superfine blend of bamboo and silk, but it does offer an environmentally attractive alternative to water-hungry cotton, a plant known to require increasing use of chemical fertilisers.
Medicinally its worth is only beginning to be properly researched.
We have wasted a century focusing on hemp's minor use as a recreation drug and applying the epithets of sex-crazed and psycho-druggie to anyone who advocates it as a product.
Now its catch-up time. Hemp played an important role in our past, and, I predict, it will play an equally important role in our future

King Hazza – Your tenants may well have been neglecting the property maintenance, but that would be because they devoting all their energies to the close management of their needy wacky-tobaccy crops coddled in their hydroponic gro-tube humicribs in the chosen ceiling/closet. So to use this quip to SUPPORT the notion that real-world hemp crops should perform magnificently under neglectful management compounds several logical flaws.

Halduell, if I was a cross dresser I daresay I’d be pleased with DuPont's actions, at least in regard to the preferred material for making stockings. And do you and King Hazza really believe the incessant hype about the plant’s alleged unnatural capacity to grow without normal rations of nutrient, water and management per unit dry weight? At what time of the day do you suspend your disbelief? When you get up? Sure some plants have slightly higher water use efficiency than some others but the claims are for an order of magnitude improvement; which is rubbish.

Yellow Kraken is right on the mark. As one who has actually tried growing it, she/he has found that it needs normal agricultural inputs of nutrients, water, cultivation, competition control (weeds) and protection from pests and diseases.

Proposals to produce hemp as a financially viable industrial feedstock will require reallocation of large tracts of cropping land (suited to combine harvester or similar) committed to the enterprise for a long term, development of protection (chemical, breeding, biotechnology or IPM) from whichever pest or disease proves to be its plague nemesis, major upgrade of road and water infrastructures, impact on the aesthetic of whichever location is finally chosen for the establishment of a major bio-refinery, one that is owned and operated by a profit-motivated corporation.

All of which I have no problem with but other biomass enterprises have been baselessly pilloried by Leigh and many others on the basis of opposition to all the concepts in the above paragraph. Because, believe me, large scale hemp production and processing into fibre or diesel will NOT be done on a cottage industry basis by a legion of idealistic Australian yeo-womyn/men.