Hemp is quite useful. The plant itself can be used as an alternative to materials like plastics and fossil fuels, and one of its main active components, CBD, has been found to have almost Godlike healing properties.
When the 2018 Farm Bill legalized the cultivation of industrial hemp, farmers were finally able to take advantage of the plant and cash in like never before. However, as they harvest their first batch a year later, they have discovered that things aren’t as rosy as they thought it would be. How so?
The first harvest has been disappointing.
Farmers were quick to jump into the industry, looking to take advantage of the burgeoning market, but some reports show that first-year yields have been less than impressive. Delayed planting schedules and heavy rains were to blame for this.
Indiana Farmer Mark Boyer says that the plants didn’t get as tall they ought to be, “They never canopied, ” he says, “and that created weed problems.”
Thieves looking for a good time have been stealing hemp, mistaking it for marijuana.
Theft has caused massive losses for plenty of farmers. Marijuana-seeking thieves have been breaking into farms and stealing hemp to smoke, and farmers say it’s only getting worse.
“It started with taking 20 plants and escalated to 100 plants. It was just once a week, and now it’s escalated to every day,” says New York farmer Dale Weed, “to them, it’s worthless. You can smoke a whole telephone pole of this without having any effect.”
Too much hemp is being produced.
According to a new report, 285,000 acres of hemp were grown last year in America, a 72% increase from last year’s acreage, but farmers have been struggling to find a market for their crops.
Since most of the hemp market is overseas, the already cash-strapped farmers have to find a way to compete with already established exchanges.
Some of the hemp seed was substandard.
The 2018 Farm Bill led to a boom in demand for CBD-rich hemp seed. Farmers interested in selling hemp to CBD producers require all female plants, but sad to say, the current supply can’t cater to this demand effectively.
A report from the Philadelphia Inquirer shows that many farmers have been sold hemp seeds that turned out to be male, thus unsuitable for hemp farming.
Hemp is more labor-intensive than traditional cash crops.
Unlike other crops, a lot of work goes into cultivating hemp. Many farmers currently lack the proper equipment to see the entire process through. A lot of the work, such as harvesting, also has to be done by hand, and it is tiring, backbreaking work.
The current state of affairs makes it difficult for many hemp farmers to profit from their crops. All they can do is sit tight and wait for things to settle. Experts are of the view that established hemp companies like Canopy Rivers Inc. (TSX: RIV) (OTC: CNPOF) and Wildflower Brands Inc. (CSE: SUN) (OTCQB: WLDFF) managed to survive the growing pains of hemp processing, so farmers would do well to hang in there until clear processes are defined.
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