HEMP FACTS
HEMP FACTS
Written by: Hemp Food Industries Association
- Until 1883, more than three quarters of the world's paper was made from Hemp fibre.
- In Elizabethan times, farmers were fined for not growing Hemp.
- 80% of English wood pulp is imported, destroying the forests and their delicate eco-systems in Canada and Scandinavia.
- A Hemp crop produces nearly 4 ( four) times as much raw fibre as an equivalent-sized tree plantation.
- Trees take approximately 20 years to mature. Hemp takes 4 months.
- Hemp needs no pesticides because it is unpalatable to insects.
- Hemp needs no herbicides because it grows too quickly for any weed to compete.
- Hemp paper does not need chlorine bleach, which heavily pollutes rivers near wood-pulp paper mills.
- Environmentally-sound Hemp paper is stronger, finer and longer-lasting than wood-based papers.
- Hemp paper is used for bank notes and archives.
- "You would have to smoke at least a field of this stuff to even get a smile" said Mr. Scott.
- "The earliest-known woven fabric was apparently of Hemp, which began to be worked in the eighth millennium (8,000-7,000 BC)", says Columbia History of the World 1981.
- For more than a thousand years before the time of Christ until 1883 AD, Cannabis/Hemp was our planet's largest agricultural crop and most important industry for thousands upon thousands of products and enterprises, producing the overall majority of the earth's fibre, fabric, lighting oil, paper, incense and medicines, as well as being a primary source of protein for humans and animals alike.
- The war between America and Great Britain in 1812 was mainly about access to Russian Hemp.
- Napoleon's principle reason for tragically invading Russia in 1812 was also due to Russian Hemp supplies!
- Hemp uses the sun more efficiently than virtually any other plant on the planet.
- Hemp can grow in virtually any climate and soil condition, and is excellent for reclaiming otherwise-unusable land.
- The word 'linen', until the early 1800s meant any coarse fabrics made from Hemp or flax.
- Cannabis oil was mentioned by name in the Bible. Apparently, etymologists at Hebrew University, Jerusalem confirmed that 'kineboisin' (also spelled 'kannabosm") referred to cannabis used in a holy ointment. See Exodus 30:23. N.B. King James mistranslated the word as 'calamus' in his version.
- Hempseed oil is said to burn the brightest of all lamp oils, and has been used since the days of Abraham. Scythians used to purify and cleanse themselves with Hemp oil, which made their skin "shining and clean".
- Much of the world's paper was made from Hemp until about 1850. Since the 1900s, all newspapers and most books and magazines were printed on wood-pulp paper. Cheap throwaway paper, fitting in with a disposable economy.
- Our forests, what is left of them, are being cut down 3 times as fast as they can grow.
- Hemp offers a valuable and sustainable fuel of the future, "growing oil wells". Hemp has an output equivalent to around 1000 gallons of methanol per acre year (10 tons Biomass/acre, each yielding 100 gal. methanol/ton). Methanol used today is mainly made from natural gas, a fossil fuel. Methanol is currently being studied as a primary fuel for automobiles, hopefully reducing CO2 levels.
- Henry Ford dreamed that someday automobiles would be grown from the soil. The Ford motor company, after years of research produced an automobile with a plastic body. Its tough body used a mixture of 70% cellulose fibres from Hemp. The plastic withstood blows 10 times as great as steel could without denting! Its weight was also 2/3 that of a regular car, producing better economy. Henry Ford was forced to use petroleum due to Hemp prohibition. His plans to fuel his fleet of vehicles with plant-power also failed due to Alcohol prohibition at the time.
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