On April 12, North Dakota's Senate passed the industrial hemp bill by a landslide vote of 44-3. The week before, the House passed the bill 86-7. A 1937 ban was imposed to eliminate harvests of marijuana, industrial hemp's intoxicating cousin. The Commissioner of Agriculture will now be developing regulations needed to implement the law which allows North Dakota farmers to legally grow industrial hemp. The Drug Enforcement Agency now must address the system of regulating industrial hemp in the United States.
Environmentalists point to hemp paper as a substitute for forest-consuming paper.
There are 50,000 products that can be made from hemp, from the heavy-duty roping made from hemp fibers, to the oil, food and cosmetics made from its seeds. Farmers facing sinking prices for corn, soybeans and tobacco see hemp as a possible lucrative alternative. A Pennsylvania farm bureau board earlier this month decided to see if hemp should be grown again there. A number of states, including Hawaii, Minnesota and Virginia, have introduced legislation to make the crop legal. At noon on Wednesday, a coalition of activist groups will stage a demonstration supporting Illinois Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. 's H.O.P.E. for Africa Bill.