Page 6 - Agriculture Magazine, March 2020
photo CourtesyAndrew Burgess
Hemp at mid-season, Stevensville, MT.
Bitterroot Hemp Co-op plants seeds for new Ag industry PAUL WALCZAK Bitterroot Hemp Cooperative
The passage of the 2018 US Farm Bill resulted in industrial hemp being identified as a legal agricultural crop in Montana. Legal hemp must be a variety of the plant Cannabis sativa L. containing no greater than 0.3% tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). Hemp provides a variety of environmental, agricultural and industrial uses, and American hemp proved a vital resource contributing to the Allies’ victory in World War II. An abundance of media attention concerning the potential for high profits from hemp and derivative products has piqued Bitterroot Valley interests. On the heels of the Farm Bill’s passage, sev-
eral Ravalli County residents got together in late 2018 to form the Bitterroot Hemp Co-op (BHC), becoming the first hemp co-operative in Montana. Nearly 100 people showed up for organizational meetings in early 2019, with current membership at 60 shareholders and growing. The co-op serves members with a range hemp industry interests, from farming and agricultural support, through end-product development. Pioneer hemp growers in Ravalli County faced a mixed experience in 2019. There wasn’t an extensive hemp-related agricultural knowledge base to draw from, farm equipment tailored to other crops was not well-suited for hemp, and other typical farming risks materialized. Spring and early summer weather conditions
