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UNREVISED (Note: These are the unrevised transcripts of the hearings in floor language (language spoken) ONLY. The final text will be available on the Parliamentary Internet site once editing and translation are completed.) > MA Take 0840 Legal Apr.18 32029 THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS EVIDENCE Ottawa, Thursday, April 18, 1996 The Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, to which was referred Bill C-8, respecting the control of certain drugs, their precursors and other substances and to amend certain other Acts and repeal the Narcotic Control Act in consequence thereof, met this day at 8:30 a.m. to give consideration to the bill. Hon. Sharon Carstairs (Chairman) in the Chair. The Chairman: Good morning. A few senators apparently have been delayed by another committee meeting. Senator Nolin has just joined us. We will hear from the witnesses, beginning with Hempline. Mr. Geoff Kime, Director of Operations, Hempline Inc.: Thank you, Madam Chairman and honourable senators, for this opportunity. I represent the views of business people, scientists, farmers, environmentalists and consumers from right across North America as a director of the North American Industrial Hemp Council. This organization has recently been organized to promote the development of a hemp industry in Canada and the United States. I also represent Hempline Inc. who have been doing government-sanctioned research on hemp-growing and processing for the last couple of years. It is based out of Tilsonburg in the heart of the tobacco-growing region. I also speak to you as someone who grew up on a farm northwest of London, Ontario. I have a background in mechanical engineering and machine design. I will admit, when I started in my career in engineering and business, I certainly never expected to be coming to Ottawa to speak to a Senate committee on a bill titled the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act. I have come here to speak to you today specifically about fibre hemp and how it is affected by Bill C-8. I will start with a brief history of hemp relative to Canada, followed by an explanation of exactly what fibre hemp is. I will give you have the slide presentation at that time with some background based on our experience in growing and processing it. I would also like to briefly touch on some of the many products and the potential business opportunities which these products represent. I will conclude my presentation with the effect that Bill C-7 has on fibre hemp and will explain to you the basis for our proposed amendment to the definition of cannabis in Schedule 2 that would exclude the mature hemp stocks and the fibre produced from these stocks from being defined as a controlled substance. Let us first consider the history of hemp. It has been used by humans for thousands of years to make paper, textiles, rope. Many of the manuscripts upon which our history is documented are printed on hemp-based paper. The first recorded planting in Canada was in 1606 as Port Royal, Acadia in Nova Scotia. Hemp was an important crop in helping to found this country insofar as tracts of land were often issued on the provision that hemp would be grown and sold back to Britain and France for use in their naval effort. Hemp was a thriving industry at the turn of the century. All of this is clearly documented in Lucille Brash's position paper, "The Romance and Statistics on Cannabis" which was a part of the LeDain commission in the early 1970s. If you want further background on that, I recommend you read it. Come the 1930s, the cultivation of hemp started to decline, primarily due to the competition of cotton, synthetics and other imported fibres. It was also at this time that the concern for the narcotic content in some strains of cannabis ultimately led to the total ban of hemp-growing in 1938. One of the last plantations to grow hemp was that of Howard Fraily in Forrest, Ontario, about half an hour from where I grew up. Mr. Fraily was successful in working with companies like International Harvester to develop the hemp harvester shown in this sign. UNREVISED (Note: These are the unrevised transcripts of the hearings in floor language (language spoken) ONLY. The final text will be available on the Parliamentary Internet site once editing and translation are completed.) > MA Take 0840 Legal Apr.18 32029 THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS EVIDENCE Ottawa, Thursday, April 18, 1996 The Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, to which was referred Bill C-8, respecting the control of certain drugs, their precursors and other substances and to amend certain other Acts and repeal the Narcotic Control Act in consequence thereof, met this day at 8:30 a.m. to give consideration to the bill. Hon. Sharon Carstairs (Chairman) in the Chair. The Chairman: Good morning. A few senators apparently have been delayed by another committee meeting. Senator Nolin has just joined us. We will hear from the witnesses, beginning with Hempline. Mr. Geoff Kime, Director of Operations, Hempline Inc.: Thank you, Madam Chairman and honourable senators, for this opportunity. I represent the views of business people, scientists, farmers, environmentalists and consumers from right across North America as a director of the North American Industrial Hemp Council. This organization has recently been organized to promote the development of a hemp industry in Canada and the United States. I also represent Hempline Inc. who have been doing government-sanctioned research on hemp-growing and processing for the last couple of years. It is based out of Tilsonburg in the heart of the tobacco-growing region. I also speak to you as someone who grew up on a farm northwest of London, Ontario. I have a background in mechanical engineering and machine design. I will admit, when I started in my career in engineering and business, I certainly never expected to be coming to Ottawa to speak to a Senate committee on a bill titled the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act. I have come here to speak to you today specifically about fibre hemp and how it is affected by Bill C-8. I will start with a brief history of hemp relative to Canada, followed by an explanation of exactly what fibre hemp is. I will give you have the slide presentation at that time with some background based on our experience in growing and processing it. I would also like to briefly touch on some of the many products and the potential business opportunities which these products represent. I will conclude my presentation with the effect that Bill C-7 has on fibre hemp and will explain to you the basis for our proposed amendment to the definition of cannabis in Schedule 2 that would exclude the mature hemp stocks and the fibre produced from these stocks from being defined as a controlled substance. Let us first consider the history of hemp. It has been used by humans for thousands of years to make paper, textiles, rope. Many of the manuscripts upon which our history is documented are printed on hemp-based paper. The first recorded planting in Canada was in 1606 as Port Royal, Acadia in Nova Scotia. Hemp was an important crop in helping to found this country insofar as tracts of land were often issued on the provision that hemp would be grown and sold back to Britain and France for use in their naval effort. Hemp was a thriving industry at the turn of the century. All of this is clearly documented in Lucille Brash's position paper, "The Romance and Statistics on Cannabis" which was a part of the LeDain commission in the early 1970s. If you want further background on that, I recommend you read it. Come the 1930s, the cultivation of hemp started to decline, primarily due to the competition of cotton, synthetics and other imported fibres. It was also at this time that the concern for the narcotic content in some strains of cannabis ultimately led to the total ban of hemp-growing in 1938. One of the last plantations to grow hemp was that of Howard Fraily in Forrest, Ontario, about half an hour from where I grew up. Mr. Fraily was successful in working with companies like International Harvester to develop the hemp harvester shown in this sign. He also worked at developing number of other different processing technologies which, at that time, if they had been allowed to go into full production after the ban, then we probably would have seen hemp come back as a competitive material against cotton and synthetics. Here we see Mr. Fraily on the left. He was an MP from Lambton East for two terms. He routinely grew his crop which would hit about 12 to 14 feet and he was exporting the majority of this to England. Since the prohibition in 1938, little work has been done on hemp. Some testing was done at agricultural stations during the war. The next piece of research of any significance were the studies done by Dr. Ernie Small in Ottawa in 1971. During this experiment, Dr. Small grew 350 different strains of cannabis. He concluded that there were very distinct, different varieties of cannabis, some fibre varieties and some narcotic varieties. The difference he found was in the THC content which is the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana. It is the compound which ultimately exists in the Narcotic Control Act and which this bill is trying to control. (Take 0840 begins--Dr. Kime continuing--He established that the point of distinction) MP-take 0840-April18-legal-32029 ( Mr. Kime continuing.) He established that the point of distinction between these two different types was 0.3 per cent THC by weight in the leaves and the flowers. This particular research was the foundation of our licence application to Health Canada in 1994. Given that the government had paid for this research, it was difficult for them to deny that there was a difference between fibre hemp and marihuana. Ultimately, they allowed us to grow ten acres of hemp in Tillsonburg. We planted five varieties. Here in the slide you see my partner, Joe Stroble, standing with one of the plants at the end of our project. This was the first non-governmental hemp research project since the 1940s. The interest generated from our project prompted Agriculture Canada to publish the Hemp Bulletin in December of 1994. This is quite a thorough review of exactly how to grow hemp and the number of potential uses for it. I recommend that you pick up a copy at the back, which I have supplied for you. In 1995, in part due to the interest from our project, and the widespread media coverage, as well as the fact that Agriculture Canada put out the Hemp Bulletin, there were quite a significant number of applications for field trials that went into Health Canada. In the end, in 1995, seven different groups right across Ontario, Manitoba and Saskatchewan planted a combined area of 40 acres of hemp field trials. As well, through all of this, and even preceding our work, the demand and the interest for hemp products has been brought to the forefront by many Canadian entrepreneurs who are importing a wide variety of hemp products and retailing them to an increasingly environmentally-conscious market. Many of these goods are coming from countries which have never stopped growing hemp, such as China, Hungary, Romania, Poland, and France. France has been doing a lot of work in attempting to develop strains of hemp that contain very low levels of THC. In 1993, England recommercialized industrial hemp and planted 700 acres. They have since been increasing their acreage, using these materials for textiles, paper and animal bedding. In all of these countries, a legislative distinction is made between varieties of cannabis used to produce hemp and those varieties used to produce narcotics. As well, products made from the fibre hemp are not considered illegal. At this point, I am sure you are wondering what exactly is fibre hemp? Hemp is a specific variety of the species cannabis sativa, which is an annual plant that grows from seed each year. Due to the very distinctive shape of the cannabis leaf, people routinely look at that and assume that all the physical characteristics of the plant are the same. This is simply incorrect. It would be like looking at any particular type of dog and assuming it is exactly the same as a Chihuahua or a Great Dane just because they are dogs; however, we have come to recognize there are significant differences between those types of dogs. We just do not do the same with cannabis. We see that leaf and we think "narcotic". From the work of Ernie Small and many other scientists around the world, hemp has shown to produce very low levels of THC in the leaves and flowers, generally less than 0.3 per cent compared to the 5 to 10 per cent found in marihuana. Hemp is also considered a bast fibre plant, similar to flax, meaning there are long, slender fibres produced on the outside of the stalk, and on the inside there is a core fibre which is similar to wood. I have samples of some of the stalk which I will pass around for you at this time. In this slide, you see the cross-section of the fibre sections magnified 125 times. At the top portion of the slide, we see the bast fibre, the long slender fibres used for textiles and fine paper. At the bottom, the pinkish colour is the core fibre, which is the stiff part that holds the plant up. The bast fibre, the white materials at the top, are held together and held to the stalk by a material called pectin which is a glue-like substance that we would break down through the retting process. In the samples I am passing around, you will see fibrous materials starting to come off the stalk. It is white in colour. That is material in which the pectin has been dissolved, and we can then take that fibre away. I have a picture of that here. We can see along the bottom the core fibre, the stalk, and the primary fibres along the top. The bast fibre represents 25 per cent by weight of this stalk, which is fairly typical for bast fibre plants. In order for our field trials to proceed in 1994, 1995, and this year, we have had to go through a fairly extensive licensing process with Health Canada. We have had to obtain a licence to import the seed, a licence to distribute the seed, and also a licence to cultivate the seed. The seeds are being imported from Europe. They have been proven to contain less than 0.3 per cent THC in the resulting leaves and flowers. We have tried ten different varieties of seed to date, from Poland, Hungary, the Ukraine, France and Romania. We planted our hemp using existing grain drills at a density of 60 to 80 kilograms per hectare. Ideally we want to plant this as early as possible but in the past we have been delayed due to issues surrounding our licensing. As soon as the plants are put into the ground, they germinate within two to three days depending on the moisture content and the temperature. As well, we do not use any pesticides. The main reason is that there are very few pests that attack cannabis, or hemp in particular. It grows so quickly that it chokes out any other weeds. It shuts off the light that goes to any weeds and they simply die. We are using chemical fertilizer because hemp requires quite a bit of nitrogen when it grows. Here we see some of the plants after they have started. We are planting them in a row spacing of about seven inches. Hemp requires good soil to grow in, so typically any land that supports corn or soybeans would yield high quantities of hemp. The soil also has to be non-acidic in nature with a pH above six. Here is a picture of the base of the stalks before they are about to be harvested. You can see along the bottom that there is quite a bit of foliage because the leaves fall off the stalk as it grows. As well, when we cut down the crop, many of the leaves on it also deteriorate and go back to the soil. Some studies indicate that as much as 70 per cent of the nutrients taken out of the soil when hemp grows is put back in as the leaves fall off and as it goes through the process of retting, which is breaking down the pectin and loosening the fibres. As well, hemp has a very expansive root system. It is a tap root, so it helps to get down into the soil, extracting nutrients from the subsoil and pulling them up to the top. It also helps to break up hard-packed soil from heavy machinery, allowing water to percolate back in. It also helps prevent soil erosion. Generally, hemp is not considered to be hard on the soil. As a matter of fact, it is considered to benefit the soil, and in rotation with other crops, it has an overall positive effect. Here we can see an overview of the one of the fields we grew last year. We are planting this very, very densely, as many as 200 to 300 plants per square meter. One of the questions we are always asked is what is to prevent someone from sneaking in and hiding a marihuana plant right in the middle of it? First of all, I do not think anybody would be able to find their plant if they did that because there are literally millions of plants per acre, so they would have heck of a time tracking it down. (take 850 starts, Mr. Kime continuing) As well, when people are growing cannabis for they want it to get bushy with lots of leaves whereas we want the stalks. 18April96-Legal-32029-DM (Mr. Kime continuing - so they would have heck of a time tracking it down.) As well, when people are growing cannabis for marihuana, they want it to get bushy with lots of leaves, whereas we want the stalks. If someone wanted to put a plant right in the middle, they would have to clear out a lot of space, and what they were trying to do would become quite noticeable. As well, we are cutting down fibre hemp fairly early on, when the male plants begin to pollinate and before it sets seed. People growing for marijuana would want it to go as long as possible, so there is about month differentiation. There would be a patch in the middle that would become obvious to anyone. As well, because we are growing low THC varieties, the pollen coming from the plants would cross-pollinate varieties of marihuana and ultimately dilute the strains that people have apparently worked so hard to develop. Ultimately, the worst place to plant marijuana is in a hemp field, so the concern for growing large-scale acreages of hemp affecting marihuana cultivation in the practical reality will not be a true concern. Here we see a picture of my partner Mr. Strobel cutting down our crop. It generally hits about 10 to 12 feet in our field trials after about 75 to 80 days, so it is growing extremely quickly, as much as two inches a day. You can see at the right side of the slide a cloud of pollen coming off the material. If you are allergic to pollen, you certainly do not want to be out in the middle of a hemp field when we are cutting it down. Once it is cut down, we like to turn it in a similar way that you would lay hay to allow it to dry. At the same time, this assists in mechanical defoliation and getting the leaves off and back into the ground as fertilizer, which is what they will be best for. We have used existing hay bailing equipment with some success. Hemp is very tough on equipment because it has such a thick stalk. It is very difficult. Repairs are a little higher. If we are to proceed, work will need to be done on getting new machinery for harvesting, especially if we are intending to do a textile crop. Here is again my partner standing with one of the hemp bails we produced in our 1994 field trials. At this point, I will pass around some of the samples of the materials we produced from those trials. I have some fibre here that has been extracted. Here is the fibre, and here is the core fibre that can be used to make a number of different products. As well, I have a sample of hemp medium-density fibre board which is made in Oregon. It has been tested to show that it is as strong as wood. One last sample is some hand-made paper sheets that I made at the University of Western Ontario. These are not the best samples. I just wanted to show them to you to show you the different thicknesses and grades of paper that are possible from hemp. As well, the position paper I provided you is printed on hemp-based paper. In order for us to distribute the materials once we have harvested them, we need a distribution license. The people who obtain the materials also need a distribution license, because the materials you are looking at now are technically considered a narcotic under the existing Narcotic Control Act and also under the bill we are discussing today. I have a copy of the licence we are required to attain. For whatever reason, the Americans exclude the stalks and the fibre produced from the stalks from their definition of marihuana, so it is easier for us to ship the materials into the United States to have research done on them. This does not seem to make a lot of sense. In a letter from the Drug Enforcement Agency sent to Health Canada as part of our obtaining an export permit, it states: &n bsp; The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has no legal basis to object to the importation of mature stalk of the Cannabis sativa L. plant that is completely devoid of any other part, viable seed or resin of said plant. The mature stalk of the Cannabis sativa L. plant is not included in the definition of marihuana as defined in Section 802(16) of the Controlled Substances Act of 1971 as amended. It is easier for us to move this material out of the country to have research done on it, which is unfortunate because we would like to keep the work in Canada and have Canada develop this. You are probably wondering why we have gone to all this efforts to obtain the licences and do all of this hard work. The simple reason is that there is real economic potential from the wide range of products that hemp can be used to produce. You can make textiles from the primary fibre we have shown you suitable for upholstery, wall coverings, industrial fabrics, and garments. You can also make paper and building materials. You can make fuel, ethanol and cosmetics from the seed, as well as food from the seed. There are business opportunities all the way through the value-added chain. Jobs will be created in agriculture, industry, research, and the retail sector. Currently there is no other fibre source similar to hemp that we can grow. We cannot grow cotton in Canada. As well, there is a trend in Canadian agriculture towards industrial-based crops. The elimination of the Crow rate out in the prairies has prompted many industries and farmers to look to new crops that they can grow and put value-added to the crop in the area in which they are growing. There are also opportunities for equipment and process development, which is something in which we are interested. Before all of these things can happen, there needs to be further work in market and product development and continued research and development, and a new infrastructure for primary processing must be put into place. All of this will require capital. Before this can take place, the federal government will need to implement a commercial licensing strategy for the cultivation of hemp. We will have to deal with the fact that existing legislation considers the materials I have shown you as a narcotic, so we have to exempt these from the definition of cannabis. The Chairman: I assume you are getting towards the end? Mr. Kime: Yes. If we consider fibre hemp in Bill C-8, currently, we are taking a good step towards the issuance of commercial licenses. Section 55.(1) clearly allows the Governor in Council to make regulations for the industrial uses and distribution of controlled substances. These regulatory powers as defined in section 55.(1)(a) include importation, exportation, distribution, production and sale of all materials. The world "industrial" added to the regulations gives the Minister of Health a clear mandate to implement commercial licensing. These regulations can be developed using existing models from Europe and in consultation with people that have been doing research on it, the police and other interested bodies. However, in Schedule II of Bill C-8, the definition of cannabis as a controlled substance is still too broad. The derivatives of cannabis, the stalk and the fibre are considered a narcotic, as I have indicated, so the paper, textiles, and building materials, all these products that we can make, are considered a controlled substance even though they do not contain a narcotic. This failure to exclude fibre from the definition of cannabis puts hemp into a quasi-legal status for importing these materials. It has been tolerated by Customs, but it is difficult to say how long that may last, so the status of hemp fibre must be made clear. Ultimately, the failure to exclude it is hindering research and development and slowing down the development of the Canadian hemp industry. I should like to note that the definition of cannabis does exempt non-viable seed in recognition of its commercial importance, so we are simply asking that the same be done for fibre hemp. As I pointed out, the United States clearly except stalks and fibres from its definition of marihuana. (Take 0900 starts here -- As well, under article 28 of the United Nations Single Convention) April 18, 1996/Legal/32029/lp (Mr. Kime continues) As well, article 28 of the United Nations Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs reads: This convention shall not apply to the cultivation of cannabis plant intended for industrial purposes... So there is international precedent for the amendment for which we are asking. We propose that the following addition should be made under the "but not including" section in the definition of cannabis in Schedule II of Bill C-8. We would like to add: &n bsp; (9) The mature stalk of such plant and fibre derived from such stalks. Such an amendment will allow Canada to develop hemp as a profitable resource and also allow us to also develop a competitive advantage in the global situation for the increasing demand and production of hemp materials. In conclusion, I urge you to implement this proposed amendment in order that hemp may again become a truly important crop in Canada. Mr. Roddy Heading, Director, Hemp Futures Study Group, Member of the International Hemp Association, Canadian Industrial Hemp Lobby: I agree with and support everything Mr. Kime has said. We are honoured to be appearing before the Senate subcommittee reviewing Bill C-8. We are pleased that the government has acknowledged that it is time to consider amending legislation to recognize the fundamental differences between hemp and marihuana. It is our belief that Bill C-8, in its present form, presents an insurmountable barrier to the establishment of hemp as a legitimate agricultural crop and seriously jeopardizes further opportunities for Canadian manufacturers to process and market this hemp in Canada and abroad. Until such discerning legislation is created and passed into law, our fledgling industry will be obliged to operate in an intolerable climate of vague legality and the ever-present threat of criminal prosecution, fines and prison for doing business should some future governing body decide that an unamended Bill C-8 should enforced to the letter of the law. As long as the growing hemp plant, its stalks, fibres and seed continues to be regarded as cannabis derivatives, our industry continues to face penalties of unprecedented magnitude with which no our raw material processors must comply. For this reason, the Canadian Industrial Hemp Lobby dares not leave its very existence to chance and fortune. We find it unacceptable that the future of Canadian Industrial Hemp lives in the benevolent interpretation of fine points of law. Because Canadian law does not yet clearly distinguish legitimate hemp from marijuana, our members have found it difficult, if not impossible, to approach industry with samples of innocuous fibre hemp and innocuous seed hemp for testing and evaluation. The clinging stigma of drugs and the harsh penalties the law provides keeps industry at a respectful distance from considering hemp as a new source of cellulose and vegetable raw materials. In brief, industry simply has too much to lose if they embark upon hemp testing programs and inadvertently run afoul of the law. Industry fears -- and rightly so -- the drastic consequences of criminal prosecution, negative publicity and financial loss for their innocent research efforts. Although industry is cautious, it is very curious about hemp. Until the confusion regarding the legality of the fibre and the oilseed are settled in the courts, industry cannot reasonably be expected to enter into discussions concerning the investigation of the potentials of hemp as a raw material. I have travelled to Europe on three separate occasions within the last 12 months to study the rapidly emerging European hemp market firsthand. In March of 1995, I met with Dutch hemp farmers and visited Dutch hemp garment manufacturers in Amsterdam. I saw their wares on display in the showrooms and boutiques and examined their hemp garments and hemp oil products in development. These items were of high quality, though somewhat more expensive than cotton goods. I was assured that in a very short time hemp and cotton would be equally priced.

UNREVISED

(Note: These are the unrevised transcripts of the hearings in floor language (language spoken) ONLY. The final text will be available on the Parliamentary Internet site once editing and translation are completed.)

> MA Take 0840 Legal Apr.18 32029

THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS

EVIDENCE

Ottawa, Thursday, April 18, 1996

The Standing Senate Committee on Legal and Constitutional Affairs, to which was referred Bill C-8, respecting the control of certain drugs, their precursors and other substances and to amend certain other Acts and repeal the Narcotic Control Act in consequence thereof, met this day at 8:30 a.m. to give consideration to the bill.

Hon. Sharon Carstairs (Chairman) in the Chair.

The Chairman: Good morning. A few senators apparently have been delayed by another committee meeting. Senator Nolin has just joined us. We will hear from the witnesses, beginning with Hempline.

Mr. Geoff Kime, Director of Operations, Hempline Inc.: Thank you, Madam Chairman and honourable senators, for this opportunity. I represent the views of business people, scientists, farmers, environmentalists and consumers from right across North America as a director of the North American Industrial Hemp Council. This organization has recently been organized to promote the development of a hemp industry in Canada and the United States.

I also represent Hempline Inc. who have been doing government-sanctioned research on hemp-growing and processing for the last couple of years. It is based out of Tilsonburg in the heart of the tobacco-growing region. I also speak to you as someone who grew up on a farm northwest of London, Ontario. I have a background in mechanical engineering and machine design.

I will admit, when I started in my career in engineering and business, I certainly never expected to be coming to Ottawa to speak to a Senate committee on a bill titled the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act.

I have come here to speak to you today specifically about fibre hemp and how it is affected by Bill C-8. I will start with a brief history of hemp relative to Canada, followed by an explanation of exactly what fibre hemp

is. I will give you have the slide presentation at that time with some background based on our experience in growing and processing it. I would also like to briefly touch on some of the many products and the potential business opportunities which these products represent. I will conclude my presentation with the effect that Bill C-7 has on fibre hemp and will explain to you the basis for our proposed amendment to the definition of cannabis in Schedule 2 that would exclude the mature hemp stocks and the fibre produced from

these stocks from being defined as a controlled substance.

Let us first consider the history of hemp. It has been used by humans for thousands of years to make paper, textiles, rope. Many of the manuscripts upon which our history is documented are printed on hemp-based paper. The first recorded planting in Canada was in 1606 as Port Royal, Acadia in Nova Scotia.

Hemp was an important crop in helping to found this country insofar as tracts of land were often issued on the provision that hemp would be grown and sold back to Britain and France for use in their naval effort. Hemp was a thriving industry at the turn of the century. All of this is clearly documented in Lucille Brash's position paper, "The Romance and Statistics on Cannabis" which was a part of the LeDain commission in the early 1970s. If you want further background on that, I recommend you read it.

Come the 1930s, the cultivation of hemp started to decline, primarily due to the competition of cotton, synthetics and other imported fibres. It was also at this time that the concern for the narcotic content in some strains of cannabis ultimately led to the total ban of hemp-growing in 1938.

One of the last plantations to grow hemp was that of Howard Fraily in Forrest, Ontario, about half an hour from where I grew up. Mr. Fraily was successful in working with companies like International Harvester to develop the hemp harvester shown in this sign.

UNREVISED

> MA Take 0840 Legal Apr.18 32029

THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON LEGAL AND CONSTITUTIONAL AFFAIRS

EVIDENCE

Ottawa, Thursday, April 18, 1996

Hon. Sharon Carstairs (Chairman) in the Chair.

The Chairman: Good morning. A few senators apparently have been delayed by another committee meeting. Senator Nolin has just joined us. We will hear from the witnesses, beginning with Hempline.

these stocks from being defined as a controlled substance.

He also worked at developing number of other different processing technologies which, at that time, if they had been allowed to go into full production after the ban, then we probably would have seen hemp come back as a competitive material against cotton and synthetics.

Here we see Mr. Fraily on the left. He was an MP from Lambton East for two terms. He routinely grew his crop which would hit about 12 to 14 feet and he was exporting the majority of this to England.

Since the prohibition in 1938, little work has been done on hemp. Some testing was done at agricultural stations during the war. The next piece of research of any significance were the studies done by Dr. Ernie Small in Ottawa in 1971. During this experiment, Dr. Small grew 350 different strains of cannabis. He concluded that there were very distinct, different varieties of cannabis, some fibre varieties and some narcotic varieties. The difference he found was in the THC content which is the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana. It is the compound which ultimately exists in the Narcotic Control Act and which this bill is trying to control.

(Take 0840 begins--Dr. Kime continuing--He established that the point of distinction)

MP-take 0840-April18-legal-32029

( Mr. Kime continuing.)

He established that the point of distinction between these two different types was 0.3 per cent THC by weight in the leaves and the flowers. This particular research was the foundation of our licence application to Health Canada in 1994. Given that the government had paid for this research, it was difficult for them to deny that there was a difference between fibre hemp and marihuana. Ultimately, they allowed us to grow ten acres of hemp in Tillsonburg. We planted five varieties.

Here in the slide you see my partner, Joe Stroble, standing with one of the plants at the end of our project. This was the first non-governmental hemp research project since the 1940s.

The interest generated from our project prompted Agriculture Canada to publish the Hemp Bulletin in December of 1994. This is quite a thorough review of exactly how to grow hemp and the number of potential uses for it. I recommend that you pick up a copy at the back, which I have supplied for you.

In 1995, in part due to the interest from our project, and the widespread media coverage, as well as the fact that Agriculture Canada put out the Hemp Bulletin, there were quite a significant number of applications for field trials that went into Health Canada. In the end, in 1995, seven different groups right across Ontario, Manitoba and Saskatchewan planted a combined area of 40 acres of hemp field trials.

As well, through all of this, and even preceding our work, the demand and the interest for hemp products has been brought to the forefront by many Canadian entrepreneurs who are importing a wide variety of hemp products and retailing them to an increasingly environmentally-conscious market. Many of these goods are coming from countries which have never stopped growing hemp, such as China, Hungary, Romania, Poland, and France. France has been doing a lot of work in attempting to develop strains of hemp that contain very low levels of THC.

In 1993, England recommercialized industrial hemp and planted 700 acres. They have since been increasing their acreage, using these materials for textiles, paper and animal bedding.

In all of these countries, a legislative distinction is made between varieties of cannabis used to produce hemp and those varieties used to produce narcotics. As well, products made from the fibre hemp are not considered illegal.

At this point, I am sure you are wondering what exactly is fibre hemp? Hemp is a specific variety of the species cannabis sativa, which is an annual plant that grows from seed each year.

Due to the very distinctive shape of the cannabis leaf, people routinely look at that and assume that all the physical characteristics of the plant are the same. This is simply incorrect.

It would be like looking at any particular type of dog and assuming it is exactly the same as a Chihuahua or a Great Dane just because they are dogs; however, we have come to recognize there are significant differences between those types of dogs. We just do not do the same with cannabis. We see that leaf and we think "narcotic".

From the work of Ernie Small and many other scientists around the world, hemp has shown to produce very low levels of THC in the leaves and flowers, generally less than 0.3 per cent compared to the 5 to 10 per cent found in marihuana.

Hemp is also considered a bast fibre plant, similar to flax, meaning there are long, slender fibres produced on the outside of the stalk, and on the inside there is a core fibre which is similar to wood. I have samples of some of the stalk which I will pass around for you at this time.

In this slide, you see the cross-section of the fibre sections magnified 125 times. At the top portion of the slide, we see the bast fibre, the long slender fibres used for textiles and fine paper. At the bottom, the pinkish colour is the core fibre, which is the stiff part that holds the plant up. The bast fibre, the white materials at the top, are held together and held to the stalk by a material called pectin which is a glue-like substance that we would break down through the retting process. In the samples I am passing around, you will see fibrous materials starting to come off the stalk. It is white in colour. That is material in which the pectin has been dissolved, and we can then take that fibre away. I have a picture of that here. We can see along the bottom the core fibre, the stalk, and the primary fibres along the top. The bast fibre represents 25 per cent by weight of this stalk, which is fairly typical for bast fibre plants.

In order for our field trials to proceed in 1994, 1995, and this year, we have had to go through a fairly extensive licensing process with Health Canada. We have had to obtain a licence to import the seed, a licence to distribute the seed, and also a licence to cultivate the seed. The seeds are being imported from Europe. They have been proven to contain less than 0.3 per cent THC in the resulting leaves and flowers. We have tried ten different varieties of seed to date, from Poland, Hungary, the Ukraine, France and Romania.

We planted our hemp using existing grain drills at a density of 60 to 80 kilograms per hectare. Ideally we want to plant this as early as possible but in the past we have been delayed due to issues surrounding our licensing. As soon as the plants are put into the ground, they germinate within two to three days depending on the moisture content and the temperature.

As well, we do not use any pesticides. The main reason is that there are very few pests that attack cannabis, or hemp in particular. It grows so quickly that it chokes out any other weeds. It shuts off the light that goes to any weeds and they simply die. We are using chemical fertilizer because hemp requires quite a bit of nitrogen when it grows.

Here we see some of the plants after they have started. We are planting them in a row spacing of about seven inches. Hemp requires good soil to grow in, so typically any land that

supports corn or soybeans would yield high quantities of hemp. The soil also has to be non-acidic in nature with a pH above six.

Here is a picture of the base of the stalks before they are about to be harvested. You can see along the bottom that there is quite a bit of foliage because the leaves fall off the stalk as it grows. As well, when we cut down the crop, many of the leaves on it also deteriorate and go back to the soil. Some studies indicate that as much as 70 per cent of the nutrients taken out of the soil when hemp grows is put back in as the leaves fall off and as it goes through the process of retting, which is breaking down the pectin and loosening the fibres.

As well, hemp has a very expansive root system. It is a tap root, so it helps to get down into the soil, extracting nutrients from the subsoil and pulling them up to the top. It also helps to break up hard-packed soil from heavy machinery, allowing water to percolate back in. It also helps prevent soil erosion. Generally, hemp is not considered to be hard on the soil. As a matter of fact, it is considered to benefit the soil, and in rotation with other crops, it has an overall positive effect.

Here we can see an overview of the one of the fields we grew last year. We are planting this very, very densely, as many as 200 to 300 plants per square meter. One of the questions we are always asked is what is to prevent someone from sneaking in and hiding a marihuana plant right in the middle of it? First of all, I do not think anybody would be able to find their plant if they did that because there are literally millions of plants per acre, so they would have heck of a time tracking it down.

(take 850 starts, Mr. Kime continuing)

As well, when people are growing cannabis for they want it to get bushy with lots of leaves whereas we want the stalks.

18April96-Legal-32029-DM

(Mr. Kime continuing - so they would have heck of a time tracking it down.)

As well, when people are growing cannabis for marihuana, they want it to get bushy with lots of leaves, whereas we want the stalks. If someone wanted to put a plant right in the middle, they would have to clear out a lot of space, and what they were trying to do would become quite noticeable.

As well, we are cutting down fibre hemp fairly early on, when the male plants begin to pollinate and before it sets seed. People growing for marijuana would want it to go as long as possible, so there is about month differentiation. There would be a patch in the middle that would become obvious to anyone.

As well, because we are growing low THC varieties, the pollen coming from the plants would cross-pollinate varieties of marihuana and ultimately dilute the strains that people have apparently worked so hard to develop.

Ultimately, the worst place to plant marijuana is in a hemp field, so the concern for growing large-scale acreages of hemp affecting marihuana cultivation in the practical reality will not be a true concern.

Here we see a picture of my partner Mr. Strobel cutting down our crop. It generally hits about 10 to 12 feet in our field trials after about 75 to 80 days, so it is growing extremely quickly, as much as two inches a day. You can see at the right side of the slide a cloud of pollen coming off the material. If you are allergic to pollen, you certainly do not want to be out in the middle of a hemp field when we are cutting it down.

Once it is cut down, we like to turn it in a similar way that you would lay hay to allow it to dry. At the same time, this assists in mechanical defoliation and getting the leaves off and back into the ground as fertilizer, which is what they will be best for.

We have used existing hay bailing equipment with some success. Hemp is very tough on equipment because it has such a thick stalk. It is very difficult. Repairs are a little higher. If we are to proceed, work will need to be done on getting new machinery for harvesting, especially if we are intending to do a textile crop.

Here is again my partner standing with one of the hemp bails we produced in our 1994 field trials.

At this point, I will pass around some of the samples of the materials we produced from those trials. I have some fibre here that has been extracted. Here is the fibre, and here is the core fibre that can be used to make a number of different products. As well, I have a sample of hemp medium-density fibre board which is made in Oregon. It has been tested to show that it is as strong as wood. One last sample is some hand-made paper sheets that I made at the University of Western Ontario. These are not the best samples. I just wanted to show them to you to show you the different thicknesses and grades of paper that are possible from hemp. As well, the position paper I provided you is printed on hemp-based paper.

In order for us to distribute the materials once we have harvested them, we need a distribution license. The people who obtain the materials also need a distribution license, because the materials you are looking at now are technically considered a narcotic under the existing Narcotic Control Act and also under the bill we are discussing today. I have a copy of the licence we are required to attain.

For whatever reason, the Americans exclude the stalks and the fibre produced from the stalks from their definition of marihuana, so it is easier for us to ship the materials into the United States to have research done on them. This does not seem to make a lot of sense. In

a letter from the Drug Enforcement Agency sent to Health Canada as part of our obtaining an export permit, it states:

&n bsp; The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) has no legal basis to object to the importation of mature stalk of the Cannabis sativa L. plant that is completely devoid of any other part, viable seed or resin of said plant. The mature stalk of the Cannabis sativa L. plant is not included in the definition of marihuana as defined in Section 802(16) of the Controlled Substances Act of 1971 as amended.

It is easier for us to move this material out of the country to have research done on it, which is unfortunate because we would like to keep the work in Canada and have Canada develop this.

You are probably wondering why we have gone to all this efforts to obtain the licences and do all of this hard work. The simple reason is that there is real economic potential from the wide range of products that hemp can be used to produce. You can make textiles from the primary fibre we have shown you suitable for upholstery, wall coverings, industrial fabrics, and garments. You can also make paper and building materials. You can make fuel, ethanol and cosmetics from the seed, as well as food from the seed. There are business opportunities all the way through the value-added chain. Jobs will be created in agriculture, industry, research, and the retail sector. Currently there is no other fibre source similar to hemp that we can grow. We cannot grow cotton in Canada.

As well, there is a trend in Canadian agriculture towards industrial-based crops. The elimination of the Crow rate out in the prairies has prompted many industries and farmers to look to new crops that they can grow and put value-added to the crop in the area in which they are growing. There are also opportunities for equipment and process development, which is something in which we are interested.

Before all of these things can happen, there needs to be further work in market and product development and continued research and development, and a new infrastructure for primary processing must be put into place. All of this will require capital.

Before this can take place, the federal government will need to implement a commercial licensing strategy for the cultivation of hemp. We will have to deal with the fact that existing legislation considers the materials I have shown you as a narcotic, so we have to exempt these from the definition of cannabis.

The Chairman: I assume you are getting towards the end?

Mr. Kime: Yes. If we consider fibre hemp in Bill C-8, currently, we are taking a good step towards the issuance of commercial licenses. Section 55.(1) clearly allows the Governor in Council to make regulations for the industrial uses and distribution of controlled substances.

These regulatory powers as defined in section 55.(1)(a) include importation, exportation, distribution, production and sale of all materials. The world "industrial" added to the regulations gives the Minister of Health a clear mandate to implement commercial licensing. These regulations can be developed using existing models from Europe and in consultation with people that have been doing research on it, the police and other interested bodies.

However, in Schedule II of Bill C-8, the definition of cannabis as a controlled substance is still too broad. The derivatives of cannabis, the stalk and the fibre are considered a narcotic, as I have indicated, so the paper, textiles, and building materials, all these products that we can make, are considered a controlled substance even though they do not contain a narcotic.

This failure to exclude fibre from the definition of cannabis puts hemp into a quasi-legal status for importing these materials. It has been tolerated by Customs, but it is difficult to say how long that may last, so the status of hemp fibre must be made clear. Ultimately, the failure to exclude it is hindering research and development and slowing down the development of the Canadian hemp industry.

I should like to note that the definition of cannabis does exempt non-viable seed in recognition of its commercial importance, so we are simply asking that the same be done for fibre hemp. As I pointed out, the United States clearly except stalks and fibres from its definition of marihuana.

(Take 0900 starts here -- As well, under article 28 of the United Nations Single Convention)

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(Mr. Kime continues)

As well, article 28 of the United Nations Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs reads:

This convention shall not apply to the cultivation of cannabis plant intended for industrial purposes...

So there is international precedent for the amendment for which we are asking.

We propose that the following addition should be made under the "but not including" section in the definition of cannabis in Schedule II of Bill C-8. We would like to add:

&n bsp; (9) The mature stalk of such plant and fibre derived from such stalks.

Such an amendment will allow Canada to develop hemp as a profitable resource and also allow us to also develop a competitive advantage in the global situation for the increasing

demand and production of hemp materials.

In conclusion, I urge you to implement this proposed amendment in order that hemp may again become a truly important crop in Canada.

Mr. Roddy Heading, Director, Hemp Futures Study Group, Member of the International Hemp Association, Canadian Industrial Hemp Lobby: I agree with and support everything Mr. Kime has said. We are honoured to be appearing before the Senate subcommittee reviewing Bill C-8. We are pleased that the government has acknowledged that it is time to consider amending legislation to recognize the fundamental differences between hemp and marihuana.

It is our belief that Bill C-8, in its present form, presents an insurmountable barrier to the establishment of hemp as a legitimate agricultural crop and seriously jeopardizes further opportunities for Canadian manufacturers to process and market this hemp in Canada and abroad. Until such discerning legislation is created and passed into law, our fledgling industry will be obliged to operate in an intolerable climate of vague legality and the ever-present threat of criminal prosecution, fines and prison for doing business should some future governing body decide that an unamended Bill C-8 should enforced to the letter of the law.

As long as the growing hemp plant, its stalks, fibres and seed continues to be regarded as cannabis derivatives, our industry continues to face penalties of unprecedented magnitude with which no our raw material processors must comply. For this reason, the Canadian Industrial Hemp Lobby dares not leave its very existence to chance and fortune. We find it unacceptable that the future of Canadian Industrial Hemp lives in the benevolent interpretation of fine points of law.

Because Canadian law does not yet clearly distinguish legitimate hemp from marijuana, our members have found it difficult, if not impossible, to approach industry with samples of innocuous fibre hemp and innocuous seed hemp for testing and evaluation. The clinging stigma of drugs and the harsh penalties the law provides keeps industry at a respectful distance from considering hemp as a new source of cellulose and vegetable raw materials.

In brief, industry simply has too much to lose if they embark upon hemp testing programs and inadvertently run afoul of the law. Industry fears -- and rightly so -- the drastic consequences of criminal prosecution, negative publicity and financial loss for their innocent research efforts. Although industry is cautious, it is very curious about hemp. Until the confusion regarding the legality of the fibre and the oilseed are settled in the courts, industry cannot reasonably be expected to enter into discussions concerning the investigation of the potentials of hemp as a raw material.

I have travelled to Europe on three separate occasions within the last 12 months to study the rapidly emerging European hemp market firsthand. In March of 1995, I met with Dutch hemp farmers and visited Dutch hemp garment manufacturers in Amsterdam. I saw their wares

on display in the showrooms and boutiques and examined their hemp garments and hemp oil products in development. These items were of high quality, though somewhat more expensive than cotton goods. I was assured that in a very short time hemp and cotton would be equally priced.