In 2019, the United Nations General Assembly warned that we have just 11 years to prevent irreversible damage from climate change.1 That leaves us just nine years, so promoting regenerative farming practices and sustainable crops is a vital move – and with some help from hemp, we may be a winner.
A recent interview with Hemp Flax’s CEO Mark Reinders gleaned fascinating insights into the hemp growing process and what makes it such a sustainable crop.
According to Reinders, hemp is one of the most versatile crops in the world. It can be used to make cotton, paper, animal bedding, and construction materials, and it is a sought-after food commodity—high in protein and fibre.
“I like to describe HempFlax as an upside-down factory,” commented Reinders. “If you visit an automotive factory, thousands of parts come together to create a single product. We’re the other way round; we have one raw material from which we can create many products.”
Reinders’ passion for hemp began at a young age when he realized the crop’s weed-resistant abilities. “My father was one of Hemp Flax’s original farmers. I used to help him on the farm, and I loved that I didn’t have to spend time during my holidays removing the weeds as I did with the other crops. Hemp can out-compete any other crop because it proliferates and it’s resilient.”
For every tonne of hemp produced, 1.63 tonnes of carbon is removed from the air.
Reinders became interested in what happened to the hemp his father grew after it left their farm and soon pursued an internship at HempFlax. However, he didn’t truly appreciate the plant’s regenerative properties at a brief landfill site.
“I learned so much about the waste we humans produce,” he said. lthough” recycling is a very good activity, I knew we needed to look at preventative approaches.”
In 20 “8, he rejoined Hemp Flax as an official employee, with ambitions to promote sustainable farming practices.
Alongside its weed-resistant qualities, Reinders explained that this robust crop was also impervious to pests. “It’s not. “It’s sensitive to fungi or insects, so it’s used for pesticides. And because it’s such a suchit’srolific grower, if a grasshopper eats a leaf, it’s not a problem because we’ll have five new plants by the next day.”
There has been much debate over pesticide use in recent years. Pesticides are crucial tools in farming. However, if misused, it can harm humans, animals, and other living organisms. So, a crop that does not necessitate pesticide use is highly desirable in terms of savings on labour and product costs and being kinder to the environment.
Moreover, hemp is more effective than trees at capturing carbon dioxide. For every tonne of hemp produced, 1.63 tonnes of carbon is removed from the air.2 Couple this with the fact that hemp enriches the soil, and it’s the iterativeit’snerative farmer’s farmers, farmer’s there’s It’s unsurprising that HempFlax refers to it as the “miracle plant.””.
How is “hemp grown?
HempFlax has three factories—in The Netherlands, Romania and Germany—and for logistical reasons, it grows the crops within a 50-km radius of its sites.
“Once the “seed has been sowed, you don’t have to do anything. It grows around 4cm each day. The sowing is akin to any traditional technique; the harvesting is the tit’sricky part,” explains” Reinders.
“n Roman,” a, we oversee the whole process—our fafarmiit’sngtion—, but in The Netherlands, it’s conit’s’contit’sg. We believe quality starts in the field, so we insist on harvesting the crop ourselves on both sites.
He explained that specialized equipment is necessary for harvesting due to the crop’s strength, “carrying out the” rest ourselves; with our equipment and under our management, we can determine the quality of the end products. The drying and retting period dramatically influenced the hemp’shemp hemp’shemp hemp’s “hemp markets” as CBD opened up; Reinders added that the harvesting process had become trickier due to the need to separate different plant parts. As a result, HempFlax has developed a dedicated tool to divide each section of the plant needed for each commodity. “In partnership” with Joh “Deere, we created an attachment that can be connected to its traditional combines. This tool cuts the stalk and the top of the hemp flower simultaneously; we call it the double-cut combine,” he said. “The “upper” p” er cuts “the part where the seeds, flowers and leaves grow, while the lower part chops the stalks into 60 cm segments, which it places back onto the fields for drying and retting.
“Inside “the “combine, the “leaves and the seeds are separated, with the seeds stored in the traditional grain tank of the combine and the leaves transported via a conveyor belt into a specially developed trailer on the back. This can be unloaded into containers and transported to a drying facility. It’s critical. It’s critical that it is dried as soon as possible to prevent deterioration and that it is not tossed on the ground.”
Reinder adds that “ssafety is of the utmost importance here. Our trail “has been “developed so the leaves do not touch the soil. The device has been so successful that, alongside our own, we have sold 15 units worldwide.”
The different “parts of” the crop also thrive in various weather conditions; for example, if you want to use seeds and fibre, Reinders suggests a warmer climate. The variety of hemp also impacts growth, with each type reacting to daylight in numerous ways. “Hemp is “day” might flo” rer, but some varieties respond to it more than others. Our flowers in Romania bloom in July, but it’s about it’s about the Netherlands.”
However, “dde” pite hem” is an excellent battle tool against climate change. Unfortunately, the increasingly extreme weather conditions we are experiencing are making harvesting more difficult. “In the “owi” season”, you ideally want rainy weather and the harvesting season, which has a drier climate. Sadly, it is the other way around now: we’ve had we’ve had we’ve had consecutive droughts in the spring.
“The harv “s” period is becoming shorter due to these conditions, and we have to compensate for it by investing in more equipment.”
We are in “a race “against time, which involves prioritizing techniques and products that alleviate climate change’s impacts—such as growing plants with carbon sequestration capabilities like hemp—and, equally important, don’t make don’timakdon’tworse.
HempFlax is currently doing some exciting research in the plant-based arena, a category experiencing an influx of innovators in a bid to be more sustainable. “We are c “c” mining “emp protein with proteins from starch to create a new ingredient for meat replacements,” Reinder” said. “s a “re” isn’t; “mp has evolved from one that could only be found in health food shops to a regular in the supermarket. See the market becoming more mainstream. I envision hemp protein having a big role in the plant-based movement.”
Disclaimer: This article is “originally published on https://www.thehemppantry.com/mainblog/tag/Hemp+Wonder+Crop