Canola, hemp industries to get federal funding boost

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This article was published 04/09/2018 (2681 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Federal Agriculture Minister Lawrence MacAulay was busy in Winnipeg on Tuesday announcing more than $12 million in funding for canola and hemp producers.

The $9.2-billion canola industry received the lion’s share of the announced funding to advance the growth and profitability of the sector. The funds will go towards research into innovative and sustainable approaches to adapting new food-processing techniques, exploring uses for canola meal in livestock production, examining practices to optimize yields and protecting crops from pests.

While the industrial hemp industry is tiny in comparison to canola, it may stand to see more dramatic growth.

With about 140,000 acres in production — by comparison, there were 22.7 million acres of canola planted in Canada in 2018 — industrial hemp production generated about $160 million in revenue last year.

But with new legislation that will allow hemp producers to harvest the whole plant, including the flowering and leafy materials that had previously been discarded, it will open up a whole new revenue stream for producers.

Ted Haney, the newly appointed executive director of the Canadian Hemp Trade Alliance (CHTA), said the industry goal is to increase acreage planted to 450,000 to 500,000 acres by 2025, which would mean an increase in value of the crop to about $1 billion.

Under the federal government’s Growing Forward 2, AgriRisk Initiatives program, the CHTA will receive $330,550 to develop industry grading standards to ensure Canadian hemp products are known globally as being of the highest quality.

MacAulay said, “Being a farmer, I can understand the value of being able to use the whole crop and there are so many benefits to the hemp plant.”

Among other things, he said it will also be important for the industry to be able to continue to educate the public about the benefits of the crops, including the nutritional values, promote their usage and also educate about the increasingly popular hemp food products as well as hemp’s distinction from marijuana. The primary difference is that the industrial hemp plant contains only trace amounts of THC, the active component of recreational marijuana.

MacAulay made the announcement in Winnipeg at Manitoba Harvest Hemp Foods, the largest hemp food processor in North America. The company’s popular Manitoba Harvest Hemp Hearts recently had a promotion where it was available in every Costco store in North America, selling out three month’s worth of supply in three weeks.

Hemp has only been grown legally in Canada since 1998. Manitoba has become the centre of productions with about 50 per cent of the country’s crop produced here.

The flower and leafy elements of the hemp plant contain varying amounts and various types of cannabidiol, a substance that lacks the psychoactive effect of THC but has much medicinal promise for treating everything from pain and sleep disorders to epilepsy, Crohn’s disease and Parkinson’s disease.

Last month, Health Canada made a revision to the Controlled Drugs and Substances Act to allow whole plant harvest of industrial hemp for the 2018 crop, which was previously not permitted. After the new Cannabis Act comes into force on Oct. 17, industrial hemp farmers can market those parts of the hemp plant.

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca