March 12, 2021 Kimberly J. Decker
There’s more hemp out there than the industry knows what to do with.
Once the 2018 Farm Bill decriminalized hemp cultivation at the federal level, growers of everything from canola to tobacco started seeing green in the idea of dedicating acreage to the cannabis plant—which, as the source of cannabidiol (CBD), also happens to be the source of one of the most hyped botanicals to hit the health-and-wellness sector in years. But as often occurs when entrepreneurial spirits rush in to satisfy what they suspect will be stratospheric demand, these newly minted hemp farmers overshot the mark and grew more hemp than the market could absorb. When Nutritional Outlook explored the state of the nation’s hemp supply in late-2019, things were already in a state of surplus, with the Washington, DC-based advocacy organization Vote Hemp noting in its 2019 U.S. Hemp Grower License Report that licensed domestic hemp acreage had quadrupled over the previous year’s figure, with 510,000-plus acres licensed to grow hemp in 34 states at the time.