Pro-hemp forces await court ruling

By Sean Wolfe
Ashland Daily Tidings

In an effort to keep a quarter-billion dollar market for hemp-based products and foods alive, pro-hemp activists plan to stage a picnic near Drug Enforcement Administration offices and headquarters nationwide.

They hope that by offering a variety of foods to agents and citizens they will be able to call attention to recent DEA rulings, and prevent the Bush administration from banning what has been the legal sale of hemp seed and oil products throughout the U.S.

The event is slated to hit more than 70 DEA outposts throughout the country at noon on April 21, and it comes as a reaction to last month's announcement of the DEA's "Final Rule" with respect to hemp foods. That rule echoes the administration's earlier "Interpretive Rule" issued in 2001, which banned edible hemp seed or oil products containing "any THC" - the active ingredient in marijuana. Thus far, the earlier rule never went into effect, owing to a stay from the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco. Hemp industry representatives and others expect the court to issue a new decision later this week.

"The Court's decision will effectively make or break the hemp foods industry," noted David Bronner, who chairs the Hemp Industry Association's Food and Oil Committee. Bronner is also president of Dr. Bronner's Magic Soaps, a product based on hemp oil.

Locally, merchants involved in hemp foods were largely unaware of the DEA-targeted action and expected court ruling, or how their businesses would be impacted.

Caldera Brewing Co.'s Jim Mills, whose Hemp Brown Ale took the gold medal at last year's North American Beer Awards, said he was more concerned over recent talk of a beer tax in Salem than the DEA's struggle with the court.

"I've got some breaking news - we're discontinuing that beer. The sales just weren't there, so I've got four pallets left, I've got them on special, and we're blowing them off the docks for $50 a keg," Mills said.

Mills said he used hemp seed as a flavoring agent in the brew, but he said customers throughout the Pacific Northwest generally preferred hoppy-tasting brews over brown ales, which taste more malty, and have lower alcohol content.

"Brown ale is a tough sell in the Pacific Northwest. It's disappointing, but if you really know the market, you have to ask yourself what the hell you're doing by throwing a malty, easy-drinking beer at it. Frankly, I'm paying a lot more attention to the tax increase than anything else right now. The neo-Prohibitionists out there have me pretty worried," he said.

Annie Hoy, outreach coordinator for the Ashland Food Co-op, said that while the co-op deals extensively in hemp-based foods like granola, waffles, energy bars and other products, they were not such a significant part of the store's business that a bottom-line impact would be felt were the DEA ruling to be upheld by the courts.

"We used to carry a lot more hemp products, but that kind of cut back after the first brouhaha (in 2001)," Hoy said.

"We didn't pull anything off the shelf, because … we don't feel it's incumbent on the retailer to do that. We don't feel the DEA is going to come in and start pulling products off our shelves. It's really more of a manufacturer and distributor issue to say 'this product is unavailable,'" Hoy said.

Hoy went on to say that co-op customers like the nutritional profile of hemp-based foods because they are rich in Omega-3 fatty acids.

"It's the fatty acid that's least found in the typical American diet, and it's an essential one. So whether you buy it in oils, or consume seeds in granola or hemp waffles, you're getting a good source of essential nutrition, and we like hemp for that reason," Hoy said.

In the meantime, attorneys working for the Occidental, Calif.-based Hemp Industry Association are lobbying the appellate judges in San Francisco to keep the new DEA ruling at bay.

Patrick Goggin, a private attorney working on the case, said he was hopeful the three-judge panel would issue a stay on the new DEA ruling.

"If not then it's virtually the death-knell for the industry," Goggin said in a telephone interview from San Francisco.

"One of the judges (Reagan-appointee Alex Kazinski) has asked really tough questions (of both sides). And he feels very protectionist against agencies over-reaching. If we can convince him that this is a case of the DEA over-reaching, then we stand a pretty good chance."