KEY agriculture sector names are lining up to back industrial hemp as a food crop, but advocates say access to the billion-dollar global industry is shrouded in bureaucracy.
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Hemp fibre crops were legalised in NSW in 2008, but producers said the lack of legal approval for hemp seeds as food prevents the industry from gaining acceptance as a mainstream broadacre crop.
NSW Agriculture Minister Niall Blair and his Labor counterpart Mick Veitch last week hailed the potential of hemp and the cash bonanza it could bring to the state.
Currently, eating and selling hemp seeds as food is illegal only in Australia and New Zealand, due to fears over interference with drug testing devices, as well as legal and treaty issues.
The results of a bi-national investigation into hemp food could be as far as 18 months away.
Advocates also lament the public perception of hemp as a drug, despite the plant containing little of the psychoactive agent tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) found in its cousin, cannabis.
Despite the hurdles, hemp has strong support, with the Industrial Hemp Association NSW, Northern Rivers Hemp, and Macquarie 2100 lauding the plant for its versatility, water efficiency, and potential as a rotation crop.
In 2014 Hemp Foods Australia said the industry was responsible for $13 million of trade in Australia with more than 350 per cent growth from 2012 to 2013 - while the international market for hemp food has been estimated at $1 billion.
Ag Minister Niall Blair wants to see the industry take off.
"I think we should be looking at the potential of a whole range of crops and markets for NSW," Mr Blair said
"If we can do that in a way that is safe, then we will.
"That's the beauty of NSW. We have such diverse growing conditions. I know some of our cane growing areas for example would be ideal for hemp production.
"It's our job to make sure we go through all the required frameworks, but this is about opening up markets where we can for our producers."
NSW Greens MP Jeremy Bucking- ham took Mr Blair to task over the untapped potential of hemp during budget estimates, admitting in parliament he had "broken the law" by eating hemp seeds for breakfast.
"There is an international market for hemp food products worth more than $1 billion and Australian farmers are missing out on this opportunity because of the lack of political courage to bring our regulations in line with the rest of the world," Mr Buckingham said.
In its submission to the federal Agricultural Competiveness White Paper, ecological farming advocates Macquarie 2100 backed hemp as a potential flagship crop for Australian agriculture.
Macquarie 2100 executive officer John Ryan said hemp could become the cornerstone of the emerging 3D printing industry.
"My ultimate vision is that cockies will order a 3D printer and get their guys to feed hemp in at one end, and pump out hemp-composite box trailers at the other," Mr Ryan said.
The Australia and New Zealand Ministerial Forum on Food Regu- lation has urged its Food Regulation Standing Committee (FRSC) to progress its study on low-THC hemp as a food source as quickly as possible.
The FRSC will address roadside drug testing, cannabidiol levels, legal and treaty issues and concerns that the marketing of hemp in food may confuse consumers about the acceptability and safety of cannabis.
A report on project outcomes will be considered in the first quarter of 2016.
Legalising hemp could be a game changer - Bob Doyle, pictured above
BOB Doyle grows hemp for fibre - and like his fellow NSW producers, can't wait for hemp seed to be legalised as a food source.
"Legalising (hemp food) could be a game-changer. Well, we hope so anyway. It'll certainly change the areas that hemp is grown," said Mr Doyle (pictured left, and on our cover).
"The Hunter, for example, is not a great grain growing area, but while the hemp food aspect is getting sorted, we will be growing some for grain.
"The food just needs a bit of momentum to get underway."
Mr Doyle is planting a crop that could see industrial hemp stretch across 50 hectares of his farm at Vacy, near Dungog, by mid-summer.
He was one of several Hunter farmers who began growing hemp in 2008 as part of a trial for Eco Fibre, with a number of that group now transforming the old Maxwell's Timber Mill in Dungog as a hemp processing facility.
Mr Doyle said while hemp had been wrongly tainted by links to marijuana, its versatility and suitability as a rotation would eventually prove doubters wrong.
"For a fibre crop, you're targeting about 12 tonnes to the hectare," he said.
"When it's at that weight, it has a value of $170 to $180 per tonne of dry matter.
"It's not a bad money spinner."
