The 2019 growing season has been full of challenges for hemp growers in the Mid-Atlantic States as they are used to drier climate during the harvesting season; however, this season, spring was soggy, and summer was humid.
Hemp growers in the legalized states depend on state-level experts to help oversee the crop since the Department of Agriculture in the U.S has not enacted federal regulations for hemp production.
For instance, the director of Pennsylvania State University’s Southeast Agricultural Research and Extension Center, Alyssa Collins, and Krystal Snyder, an extension educator at Penn State, have been offering guidance to the hemp farmers while observing performance of the crop in the region.
The department of agriculture in Pennsylvania estimates that 80-90% of farmers are growing hemp for CBD while the remaining percentage is growing for fiber, or both. Three hundred nineteen farmers who were permitted to grow hemp have cultivated about 8,000 acres this year. In Pennsylvania, there are 67 counties, and 63 of them are growing the crop.
The main concern of the crop specialists, Collins and Snyder, is that the small number of hemp farmers who have contracts with buyers for their crops (about half of the fiber producers and 25% of CBD producers).
Lack of an sassured buyer at the time of planting wasn’t the only challenge that farmers in the state had to grapple with. For example, the rainy season started from May to June in Pennsylvania, which delayed the planting season for hemp and grain crops. Moreover, to make it worse during summer, which is supposed to be sunny, the weather was humid, worsening the condition of the planted crops.
Furthermore, farmers could not work on their land during the spring as the ground was soggy, making it hard for the drills and planters to get into their lands, causing them to plant past the ideal planting time.
Biomass production was also affected because the crop flowered before it had enough time for vegetative growth. Due to the weather conditions, most of the crops had leaf-spotting fungi, which affected the yield as well as the quality of the produce. Gray mold and root rot were also evident, although not widespread.
Corn eating worms and caterpillars also infested about 20% of the hemp flowers and ripened seeds. And, since there are no pesticides approved for use on hemp crops in Pennsylvania, the farmers had no way of controlling the infestation.
The yields and quality of the hemp products produced also depended on the variety of the crop grown. Some fiber farmers chose European types such as Futura 75, while others chose Canadian variety CRS-1. The latter is not very tall thus limiting their biomass yield. The CBD farmers chose Lifter and Magic bullet among others.
Now that some farmers have started harvesting their hemp, it remains to be seen whether they will get buyers who will pay a rate that will enable the farmers to recoup their investment and earn a profit.
Analysts wonder what advice hemp industry actors like Therma Bright Inc. (TSX.V: THRM) (OTC: THRBF) and The Green Organic Dutchman Holdings Ltd. (TSX: TGOD) (OTCQX: TGODF) would for farmers so that they can avoid the problems they have faced this year.
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