US: HELP, WE’RE RUNNING
OUT OF HEMP!
American farmers are struggling to meet CBD demand
while consumers grow impatient
“If the molecule is of interest and becomes broadly distributed, it
will need to be far more efficient than what we have today.”
Erica Stark, executive director of the National Hemp Association,
fears that it will take some time before the US competes with major
players in the international industrial hemp market.
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VAPOUROUND CBD MAGAZINE
“It’s not as simple as growing
tomatoes. The possibility
of failure to produce quality
cannabis extracts is huge.”
Ms Stark said:
“The danger we’re facing now is over-enthusiasm.
“We just don’t have the infrastructure to go into full commercial
production. Yet.”
Meanwhile, the US Hemp Authority has awarded 13 CBD
companies with a high-quality seal.
The US Hemp Authority Certified Seal program was established
last year with guidance from collaborators including the Hemp
Industries Association.
Companies to be awarded the seal include Bluebird, GenCanna
and Charlotte’s Web.
Marielle Weintraub, PhD, president of the US Hemp Authority, said:
“Consumers need to be able to tell who the good guys are — who’s
doing their best to make sure the product is safe.”
Farmers in the US are struggling to meet the soaring demand for CBD.
The hemp-CBD market is estimated to hit $22 billion by 2022,
according to the Brightfield Group. But with so much to learn,
farmers new to the newly-legalised US industry are struggling to
keep up.
George Weiblen, a professor at the University of Minnesota, said:
“There are huge challenges to producing the industrial hemp
required for meeting the demand.
“It’s not as simple as growing tomatoes. The possibility of failure to
produce quality cannabis extracts is huge.”
With CBD extracted exclusively from the flower itself and not the
whole plant like its biological cousin marijuana, current farming
techniques are an incredibly costly means of production.
There is also the legal consideration of staying within the 0.3
percent (or 0.2 percent) THC limit. If the crop exceeds this, it is
classed as marijuana which remains federally illegal.
Yet farmers do not know how much THC is in the plant until it
is processed and the CBD is extracted. Even then, many have
reported discrepancies between lab reports of the same samples.
David Williams, an agronomist at the University of Kentucky, said: