Inside a nondescript office building in Englewood, a deafening alarm stops a team of workers in lab coats and hair nets. It’s a sensor alerting staff to a potential problem with the product, tiny bottles of cannabidiol moving along a conveyor belt at a swift pace. The vials are headed to a fulfillment warehouse where […]
hemp
Posted inBusiness, News, Politics and Government
Colorado’s plan to build a foundation for industrial hemp
“My name is Jared Polis and hemp — it’s everything.” This was the message Colorado’s governor used to sign off on an order declaring June 6–13 Hemp Week in the Centennial State, and he is staking his legacy on the often-maligned plant that had been illegal to grow in the U.S. for nearly 50 years. […]
Posted inBusiness, News, Politics and Government
Colorado hemp farmers say they know more than the feds and want to keep regulation in state hands
As Colorado hemp growers ready their fields and greenhouses for an anticipated 120,000-acre crop this year, state policymakers are working on a plan to bypass proposed federal rules that threaten to wither the promise of the state’s hemp industry. Colorado has had its own successful hemp oversight program for six years, and the Colorado Department […]
Posted inBusiness, Environment, News
Cross-pollination between outdoor-grown marijuana and hemp is a budding conflict in Colorado, beyond
By Bart Schaneman, Marijuana Business Daily Outdoor marijuana growers are reporting an increase in cross-pollination from hemp farms, a development that could mean marijuana cultivators might lose upwards of tens of thousands of dollars if their plants become unmarketable as flower products. As the marijuana and hemp industries increasingly share the same cultivation territory, the […]
Posted inBusiness, News
A hemp green rush is remaking agriculture in Colorado — complete with get-rich CBD dreams and flimflam profiteers
DELTA COUNTY — On a sunny fall day at the tail end of harvest season, wagons piled high with what looks like bushy, green tumbleweeds are rolling in caravans past a dry, rattling cornfield, heading toward a new hemp-processing plant near Delta. These loads are piled high with hopes. Growers are banking on hemp to […]
Posted inBusiness, News
Pueblo saw hemp as an economic opportunity, so it pounced with taxpayer dollars and hopes of growing big business
PUEBLO — In 2016, Steve Turetsky was looking to get into hemp, scouting around Colorado for the right place to build the farm he would use to feed the growing market for CBD. He needed cheap land, plenty of water and infrastructure for distribution. Pueblo had all of those things — and wanted his business. […]
Posted inBusiness, Coloradans, News
Greeley still shuns marijuana, but it’s starting to embrace hemp as a new cash crop
Five years ago, Clifford Clift would have been disgusted by the fragrant plants growing in his backyard. That’s the devil’s weed, he would have said through gritted teeth, probably with some dad joke about how the world was going to pot now that his state was legalizing marijuana. Now Clift, at 79, plants 7 acres […]
Posted inBusiness, News, Politics and Government
Hemp has arrived: Colorado crops double after Farm Bill makes growing more legit
Entrepreneur Joey Coleman is enthusiastically prepping for a 40-acre “farm-to-doorstep” crop of hemp he plans to grow near Grand Junction this spring. In Monte Vista, Corbett Hefner has added an industrial hemp harvester to his heavy-equipment product line. Colorado State University-Pueblo chemistry professor Chad Kinney is preparing to host around 500 researchers from around the […]
Posted inOpinion, Opinion Columns
Opinion: Growing hemp means growing economic opportunity in rural Colorado
In 2013, I received a call from now Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell asking me, as a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, to support a pilot program to allow farmers to grow hemp. Knowing Colorado farmers’ interest in the crop, I jumped at the chance and pushed to include the program in the 2014 […]
Posted inBusiness, Health, News, Politics and Government
Federal regulators cast shadow on hemp win, calling cannabidiol — or CBD –products illegal
By Carla K. Johnson, The Associated Press The hemp industry still has work ahead to win legal status for hemp-derived cannabidiol, or CBD oil, as an ingredient in food or dietary supplements despite the big farm bill President Donald Trump signed this week designating hemp as an agricultural crop. CBD oils have become increasingly popular […]