Irish hemp trees at risk

In a letter addressed to the Irish government and the country's environmental associations, hemp growers from the green Erin region castigate the authorities for ignoring them when drawing up hemp-related regulations. The result is a regulatory framework that has led to «economic nonsense and environmental sabotage», says the Hemp Federation of Ireland (HFI), which drafted the letter.

«The transfer of food value from the harvest to the pharmaceutical and food sectors will completely destroy the environmental value that made our industry,» he said. declared HFI in the letter signed by its Executive Director, Chris Allen.

More broadly, HFI deplores the fact that the Irish Hemp Scheme, which makes only passing reference to the potential of hemp stalk, was drafted without consultation with hemp industry stakeholders.

«Our industry, as a whole, must be able to continue to develop, as it has for over 25 years, as a local, SME-based sector for food and fibers,» the letter states. «It is the sum of the potentials of culture combined and managed locally within a fully integrated development paradigm that constitutes the most exceptional pathway to climate transition.»

HFI said Ireland can only reach its full potential in hemp if the state's legislative, regulatory and financial policies are aligned, and criticized the government for a hemp legislative framework that is «now in total chaos» due to changes made in 2018.

«[These] interventions have been irrational, extreme and destructive... They show little appreciation of the current state of scientific knowledge and have severely damaged our farms, businesses and livelihoods,» the letter states. The resulting policies have taken hemp out of farmers« hands, creating a situation in which "the only hemp entering our food chain will have been synthetically cultivated in laboratories.

«We don't understand who draws government policy for our industry, but the industry remains very poorly understood in all Irish departments and agencies,» said HFI.

In 2019, an Irish Industrial Hemp Forum brought together key players in the hemp industry. Invited guests included Irish Health Minister and the main agencies under its control refused to participate, as did other key government agencies.