PA Farm Show
The beginning of January PAHIC was proud to showcase Hemp at the 102nd PA Farm Show! Thanks to the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture the industry was provided a 50′ space to show farmers and the public examples of all the amazing things hemp can do as a form of alternative medicine, its nutritional value, and various other potential health benefits. We also took the opportunity to encourage participation in the 2018 Industrial Hemp Program. Not only did we get to talk to thousands of people we also reached many thousands more with great press reports:
Many elected officials visited us
Secretary of Agriculture, Russell Redding, PAHIC President Geoff Whaling, Governor Tom Wolf, PAHIC Exec Dir, Erica McBride and PAHIC Board Member, Les Stark
PAHIC Board Member, Les Stark, Exec Dir, Erica McBride, State Senator Judy Schwank, PAHIC President, Geoff Whaling, Chief of Staff, Bill Evans
PAHIC Exec Dir, Erica McBride, State Representative, Russ Diamond, PAHIC Board Member, Les Stark
PAHIC Exec Dir, Erica McBride, Minority Ag Committee Exec Dir, Desitny Zeiders, State Representative Eddie Pashinski, PAHIC Board Member, Les Stark
PAHIC Exec DIr, Erica McBride, Representative Rich Irvin, PAHIC Board Member, Les Stark
Check out our series of Facebook Live Videos
Tour of booth https://www.facebook.com/PAHempIndustryCouncil/videos/882937798539969/
Oil seed press demonstration https://www.facebook.com/PAHempIndustryCouncil/videos/882999918533757/
Hempcrete Workshop Announcement https://www.facebook.com/PAHempIndustryCouncil/videos/883466131820469/
Day two announcements and updates https://www.facebook.com/PAHempIndustryCouncil/videos/883468021820280/
Hempcrete Workshop https://www.facebook.com/PAHempIndustryCouncil/videos/883543955146020/
Short clip Hempcrete Workshop, mixing https://www.facebook.com/PAHempIndustryCouncil/videos/883559405144475/
CBS21 News Anchor Michael Gorsegner, Facebook Live 13 minute segment https://www.facebook.com/840799562616442/videos/1925619347467786/
Les Stark speech, 10 minutes https://www.facebook.com/PAHempIndustryCouncil/videos/885455651621517/
Riley Cote Speech, 6 minutes https://www.facebook.com/PAHempIndustryCouncil/videos/885470398286709/
Erica McBride speech, 25 minute https://www.facebook.com/PAHempIndustryCouncil/videos/885542491612833/
2018 Hemp Program
Friday January 19th was the deadline to apply for the 2018 Industrial Hemp Program. The 2018 program is greatly improved over last year! This year permit holders will be able to grow up to 100 acres and new to this year CBD and other extractions are allowed, such as those you can find online: click here for examples. Institutional applicants are allowed unlimited acreage.
We spent all the previous week trying to help people with their applications and seed sourcing. High CBD seed sourcing has been problematic as we are still not allowed to get seed from other states and we were unable to locate international sources willing to export to the US. There still may be some people who prefer to buy their CBD products, such as CBD oil from a shop or from an online realtor. But we are still committed to our journey of finding CBD seeds to grow on our acreage. Hopefully, we will be able to produce products like CBD oil where the cost per mg isn’t too excessive, to enable it be accessed by more people, particularly those who rely on it to manage their anxiety, and other medical conditions.
We had hoped that we would be able to have a few farmers be able to participate under our permit as we work to develop the National Industrial Hemp Center of Excellence However time restraints and logistics made that impossible for us to pull off this year. Fortunately several farmers were willing to individually apply to run some varietal trials for the fiber varieties we will need to supply the CoE.
We hope to get 1000 acres in the ground this year to get the nation’s first full commercial scale decortication machinery (for fiber production) up and running. It will then be our intention to expand that to around 8000 acres at which time we would contract PA farmers to grow the crop.
Already there has been interest from PA manufacturers to start incorporating hemp into their processes and we anticipate many more once a reliable supply chain is established.
Exciting things to come!
We anxiously await finding out how many permits were submitted and will be approved. We believe that the department will get close to the goal of having all 50 permits allocated. No matter what we will see a huge increase in the number of permits and acreage over last years approximately 60 acres with the potential of there being literally thousands of acres of emerald hemp fields gracing the Pennsylvania landscape!