Let's Talk About Hemp...

I have introduced a new line of bags in my Etsy shop made from eco friendly and sustainable fabrics such as hemp, linen, organic cotton and bamboo.

I wish to buy hemp.  It is not grown or manufactured in the U.S. .....soooo, I need to send my  dollars out of the country since our government in it's effort to keep us drug free simply flat out banned the growing and harvesting of cannabis.  In researching the fabrics I am using I am learning a lot about growing, harvesting, manufacturing and arcane laws.

Hemp bags with coconut husk buttons lined with bamboo-cotton. 

 

Surely no member of the vegetable kingdom has ever been more misunderstood than hemp. For too many years, emotion-not reason-has guided our policy toward this crop. And nowhere have emotions run hotter than in the debate over the distinction between industrial hemp and marijuana.  Please read this article which is intended to inform that debate by offering scientific evidence so we can distinguish between myth and reality.

Finally....hemp is one of the easiest and sustainable  crops to grow.  Anything that can be made from cotton can be made from hemp.  Cotton is one of the most environmentally destructive agricultural crops. In pesticide use in the US alone, it is staggering – 125 million kilograms annually. Worldwide, cotton production used 50 percent of the world's pesticides/herbicides. 

Pesticides are possibly the greatest toxic threat to contaminating our soil, air, water and natural communities because they are often permanent and they bio-accumulate, ie their toxicity increases as they are consumed up the food chain. Many pesticides are known carcinogens, and can also cause immuno-deficiency disorders. Added to this, pesticides have a petroleum base and their excessive use perpetuates our dependency on oil. (Courtesy: Binhai Times).  You may want to take a look at Hemp 101 .

I am more and more tuned into what we, as a family, are doing to work with our environment as well as getting chemically engineered products out of our lives.  With my antennae up I am taking in more and more information and adding that to what I already know....which I find was surprisingly little.   So I am taking the liberty of chunking up my blog with this information.  Sorry, but this little corner of the world is mine.

In the next few weeks, I will pass along information about household cleaners, organic gardening and re-cycling.

Please, if you have something to add...I would welcome it.  The comment section is open to everyone.  Let's share what we know.