FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell wants a full pardon for hemp.
The Kentucky Republican on Monday previewed legislation seeking to free the plant from its ties to marijuana and let it take root as a legitimate crop.
Hemp marijuanas non-intoxicating cousin would be removed from the controlled substances list under the bill hes offering, McConnell said. The result would legalize hemp as an agricultural commodity.
Were going to give it everything weve got to pull it off, the Senates top leader told hemp advocates in his home state.
The crop has been grown on an experimental basis in a number of states in recent years, and Kentucky has been at the forefront of hemps comeback. Kentucky agriculture officials have approved more than 12,000 acres to be grown in the state this year, and 57 Kentucky processors are helping turn the raw product into a multitude of products.
Growing hemp without a federal permit has long been banned owing to its classification as a controlled substance related to marijuana. Hemp and marijuana are the same species, but hemp has a negligible amount of THC, the psychoactive compound that gives marijuana users a high.
Hemp got a limited reprieve with the 2014 federal Farm Bill. Mc-Connell helped push for the provision that allows state agriculture departments to designate hemp projects for research and development.
Since then, 34 states have authorized hemp research, while actual production occurred in 19 states last year, said Eric Steenstra, president of the advocacy group Vote Hemp. Hemp production totaled about 25,500 acres in 2017, more than double the 2016 output, he said.
The crop, which once thrived in Kentucky, was historically used for rope, clothing and mulch from the fiber, hemp milk and cooking oil from the seeds, and soap and lotions. Other uses include building materials, animal bedding and biofuels.
