Good News for Hemp Feed and Hempcrete in 2024
The Industrial Hemp Podcast is back after a short break. Episode one of Season Four is available now.
The theme of this episode is Good News, because there seems to be a fair amount of it these days in the hemp space.
One such piece of positivity comes to us from podcast guest Morgan Tweet, executive director of the Hemp Feed Coalition, a nonprofit organization working to gain federal approval for hemp grain as a commercial livestock feed.
“The good news to share is we’ve completed a key milestone in the regulatory pathway for federal approval, specifically for hemp seed meal, as an ingredient for laying hens,” said Tweet.
“This is a big deal,” she said. “We got the nod of approval from FDA CVM. They have made the recommendation for approval, to allow this as an ingredient. So it’s a big deal. It’s a long time coming.”
On this episode, Tweet explains the process of introducing new ingredients into the commercial feed supply and how hemp presents some unique challenges to the feed control officials.
She said there are still hoops to jump through but expects hemp seed meal to be granted approval as a feed for laying hens after a final vote by the Association of American Feed Control Officials this August.
Continuing with theme of good news, hempcrete builder Cameron McIntosh shares the news on this episode that his company Americhanvre has been awarded a Small Business Innovation Research grant.
“We received a fully funded direct-to-phase-two award, worth $1.9 million, for research and for studying the Ereasy hempcrete system and methodology,” McIntosh said. “So that’s about the best news I could give you.”
The system is a spray-applied method of building with hempcrete, a faster and more efficient delivery system compared to the traditional cast-in-place method of building with hemp.
“Building and construction are globally responsible for 30% of our carbon emissions,” McIntosh said.
“I think (this grant) is an acknowledgment by, not only the U.S. Army, but the entire Department of Defense and even the entire federal government that they need to encourage and be interested in carbon sequestering, sustainable, renewable building technologies,” he said.
We’ll also hear some good news from Patrick Atagi, president and CEO of the National Industrial Hemp Council of America, about the work his organization is doing to get hemp on a level playing field with other commodity crops in the eyes of the USDA.
And finally, Tennessee filmmakers Jordan Berger and Maxwell Duryea stop by the Lancaster Farming podcast studio in Ephrata to share some good news about their documentary about industrial hemp called One Plant. You can watch a trailer of the film at oneplant.film
Listen here:
Hemp Feed Coalition
https://hempfeedcoalition.org/
Contact the Hemp Feed Coalition
https://hempfeedcoalition.org/contact/
Americhanvre Cast Hemp
Sunflower Films: One Plant
National Industrial Hemp Council
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Mpactful Ventures
https://www.mpactfulventures.org/
Forever Green, Makers of the KP-4 Hemp Cutter