Hemp vs Canabis CBD

by Travis C | Jan 2, 2019 | 420, 420 News, Blog, Science & Technology

If you’re familiar with CBD and its medicinal benefits, you may be wondering how to get it, or even more so, where it comes from in the first place.

If you have no idea what we mean when we say CBD, check out our starter guide to CBD explaining the basics.

CBD is most commonly found in industrial hemp and cannabis plants. But is there really a difference between the two? It isn’t so much that CBD from hemp is better or worse than CBD from cannabis, but how hemp is grown compared to cannabis makes a big difference.

Hemp vs Cannabis

Traditionally, Hemp is grown on an industrial scale, hence the name industrial hemp. Plants grow closer together, forcing them to grow up instead of out.

In contrast, cannabis is grown more spaced out which allows the leaves and flowers to fan out and gain potency. While hemp is mainly used for its stalks in uses from making paper to clothing, cannabis is bred much differently.

The biggest difference between hemp and cannabis is the THC content. Hemp is grown to have minimal THC. To legally be considered hemp, that amount must be no more than .3%.

Cannabis on the other hand is usually grown to have as much THC as possible in order to provide its maximum psychotropic effects, AKA the “high”.

Hemp Legality

So, a hemp plant with a THC content of .5% would be considered psychotropic cannabis and therefore federally illegal. This is despite the fact that such a low THC content would have little to no effect on the average person.

In fact, industrial hemp was made legal in 2009 by the Industrial Hemp Farming Act. But if you couldn’t guess by the name of the bill, this only applies to industrially grown hemp.

This “legal” hemp was only permitted for use by research facilities or higher education research. So unless the hemp was being grown on an industrial scale for the sole purpose of higher education research, hemp was still illegal.

However in December of 2018 the Agricultural Act of 2018, commonly known as the Farm Bill, was passed by the House, Senate and President Donald Trump. This new farm bill changes the definitions of industrial hemp.

This means that hemp will no longer just be grown for research purposes, but an actual commercial marketplace can be established.

Hemp CBD vs Cannabis CBD

Now that hemp has been legalized, the already blurred lines separating hemp CBD and cannabis CBD from a legality standpoint have become even more blurry. However this is actually good for the consumer.

Hemp traditionally carries more CBD, whereas cannabis carries more THC. Through crossbreeding of low-THC cannabis strains with high-CBD hemp strains, new strains are being created that look, smell and taste like regular cannabis, but have .3% or less.

Soon, hemp flower will look identical to cannabis flower, and more people will start to consume high CBD flower as much as THC flower. Industrial hemp for now will still be grown mostly on large scale for mass production of CBD medications derived from the whole plant.

The reality is hemp and cannabis are the same plant, they have just been bred in different ways. Now that hemp is legal, the two will start to merge again, and we might even see some new breeds start to appear. It’s an exciting time to look into hemp.

Is Hemp Constitutional in Colorado? Harvest Special Pt. 5

by Travis C | Nov 6, 2018 | Cannabis Law & Compliance, growing, Season 2, The Real Dirt Podcast Episodes

Podcast: Play in new window | Embed

What makes hemp, hemp? Is it where it’s grown, or how its grown?

It all depends where you live at this point. The Agricultural Act of 2014 allowed farmers to grow industrial scale hemp legally, as long as the THC content was .03% or lower in the plant.

Seems simple enough. But when states have the right to make their own laws, the Agricultural Act becomes basically irrelevant. Some states require .01% THC or less to be considered legal. Other states require .05% or less, and some are even considering raising it to 1% or less THC.

Colorado’s hemp laws

Colorado is the only state in the country that actually includes cultivation in the state constitution. This means that Coloradans have the right to cultivate legally in Colorado. But that could all change soon.

A new measure being voted on this midterm would take the laws regarding hemp in Colorado, and make them statutory rather than constitutional. While the constitutional law currently allows legal cultivation of plants containing .03% THC or less, Amendment X would change that law to better reflect the federal law.

What if?

What if the people vote no on Amendment X? Hemp will remain in the constitution of Colorado, with a mandatory THC level of .03%. If the federal government were to reclassify hemp tomorrow and say the new limit is 1%, Colorado could be stuck. With the delays between introducing new laws and voting on them, it could be upwards of 2 years before Colorado could catch up with the rest of the country.

What if the people vote yes? Hemp will become statutory, not constitutional, putting it on par with federal regulation. Growing will no longer be a right, but a regulated law organized and voted on by lawmakers. There will be little noticeable change at first, as the constitutional definition of Colorado hemp is near identical to the federal definition already. But should the federal definition change to lower the plant’s controlled substance status or raise the legal THC limit, Colorado will be on par with the rest of the country.

What’s your vote?

What would you vote if you were a Coloradan in this situation? Would you want hemp to stay in control of the state, enshrined in the constitution, only to be changed by the people’s vote? Or, would you want to join the rest of the country in a unified federal regulation of hemp?