The Differences in the Plants at Chemical Level - Essay Example

d: Industrial Hemp Hemp is an old English word and is used for a type of fiber. The fiber is soft and durable and is cultivated from the plants of the Cannabis. Hemp is also denoted as another name for the same plant. In recent times, it has been increasingly used in various genres. These include its growing use in papers, textiles, plastics, construction, fuel, health food and in medical purposes. Ever since 2007 hit, hemp has found increasing prominence for its lucrativeness at the industrial level. These include paper, textiles, bio degradable plastics, construction purposes, in health food and apparently it has been successful in all these spheres. Since 2007, the commercial value of hemp has grown tremendously. Today it is considered to be the fastest growing bio mass ever known to exist. It produces around 25 tons of dry matter per hectare per year. In modern agriculture a normal average yield is tipped to be 2.5-3.5 t/ac. As a crop, hemp is also very environmentally friendly and does not require many pesticides or herbicides. Contemporary research has not focused much on soil fertility and hence there is very little data available on that front. Results and analysis show that a high yield of hemp may lead to high yielding wheat crop. Hemp is hence one of the most ancient domesticated plants that ever existed. (Citizen) There are various varieties of Hemp out there. There is cannabis sativa, sativa vary. And sativa. These are grown for industrial use whilst on the other hand sativa indica is generally known to have poor fiber quality. Its primary purpose is for use for recreational purposes and for medicinal drugs. Talking about the differences in the plants at chemical level, their major difference rests in the amount of tetraydrocannabinol that is genetically produced in the plants. It is secreted by epidermal hairs called glandular trichomes and can be easily made out on genetical grounds. (Melody) There are some oil seed and fiber varieties of cannabis as well. They have been approved for industrial hemp production and can produce very little amount of psychoactive drug. They don’t produce any physical or psychological effects. On the global scale China is the leading producer of hemp. It is also produced in Europe, Chile and Korea. Benefits and Many Uses of Industrial Hemp: Hemp is used for reasons that are manifold. It is said to produce above 50,000 products in the United States itself. These include the manufacture of textiles, cordage, and nutritional products. Cordage can be produced in varying tensile strength. The bast fiber is normally blended with some other organic fibers for instance flax, cotton and silk. These are used in the production of apparel and furnishing and have cotton and hemp in the ratio of 55:45. However 100% pure industrial hemp can also be used. It is just that more commonly it is blended and mixed with cotton. The two fibers inside the hemp tend to be woodier. Because of their characteristic properties they are used commonly in non-woven items, mulch, litter and animal bedding. (Alberta) Hemp is also used in the production of oil-based pained, as a moisturizing agent in creams, for cooking and even in plastics. Basically, the oil present in the seeds gets oxidized when exposed to air. This helps in the extraction of oil and the use of Hemp in oil based products. Hemp seeds have been very fruitful in their use as bird seed mix and now they are also used to make fishing bait, Food: The chemical composition of Hemp seeds is very interesting. They contain essential amino acids and essential fatty acids which are important for a healthy balanced human life. These can seeds can be eaten raw, can be cooked with meal, and even made into hemp milk. This milk is used to prepare tea and in baking. The fresh leaves of hemp are also eaten in salads by many. Some of the most popular products made via hemp include cereals, waffles, nut butters and hemp tofu. There are some companies who try to gain more value out of industrial hemp. They try to produce value added hemp seed items which include seed oils, the hemp grains and the dehulled hemp seeds. Hemp is also increasingly used in the production of organic cereals, in non-dairy milk and for non dairy hemp ice-cream. (Citizen) The treatment of hemp varies from one place to the other. In the UK, their department for Environment, food and rural affairs considers hemp as a completely non-food crop and is treated as one henceforth. Thus seeds of hemp appear in the UK market as legal food products. In North America, it is treated differently. There, hemp seed food products are sold in the market. They are more commonly found in health food stores and sometimes mail orders are also received. However, the United States Department of Agriculture is of the view that total potential for hemp seed remains unknown. It is still to be tapped to its full potential but for now it is a relatively small market. Paper: Hemp is also widely used in paper production. The first major coarse paper which was made from hemp goes all the way back to the Western Han Dynasty. This was some 200 years ago before paper making actually started. Cain Lon helped improve standardized paper production through his efficient use of Hemp. He made use of inexpensive materials including hemp ends some 2000 years ago. (Melody) The United States witnessed its first official experimentation with hemp in paper making in 1916. This was when chief scientists, Leyster H. Dewed and Jason L. Merrill came to the fore and suggested that the paper made from hemp was much better than that made from wood pulp. However modern research in this area is yet to confirm the positive effects of hemp herds. The overall cellulose content is only between 32% and 38%. Overall, hemp production met stiff decline till 1933. It dipped by 500 tons per year. From 1934 onwards, hemp production started increasing but it was still relatively low and there was no substantial increase in the production of paper from hemp. (Stafford) Hemp does not come cheap. Its cost of production is relatively high. It hence is not used to produce commercial high volume paper. However a small niche market resides for hemp pulp. For instance this hemp pulp is used in the production of cigarette paper. Hemp fire is also mashed and mixed with other sources than just the hemp. 1994 saw no significant production of pure hemp paper. In the year 1991, around 120,000 tons of hemp was produced world over. This was a measly 0.05% of the overall annual pulp production. This can be contrasted with the typical pulp mill produced for wood fiber. It never dips below 250,000 tons per year. Hemp pulp is at least six times more costly than the wood pulp. This is primarily because of its small size and the out dated obsolete equipment which is used in most hemp processing plants. Moreover, hemp is harvested just once a year and has to be stored for the mill throughout the year. The storage requires a lot of handling of bulky material. Another big issue is the fact that the entire hemp plant cannot be prepared for paper production. In the wood products industry all the fiber comes from harvested trees. However this is not the case with hemp pulp. Only 25% of the dried hemp stem contains the necessary strong fibers which are important for paper production. As a result retaining, maintaining and eventually using hemp pulp for paper production can be very costly as it would require heavy raw material cost. (Weiss) Jewelry Another important use of Hemp is in jewelry making. It is produced by knotting hemp twine via a famous practice called macrame. Various products made from hemp jewelry include bracelets, rings, anklets and other adornments that women wear in their everyday life. Some jewelry comprises of beads that are made from glass, wood, stones and bones. The hemp twine varies in its thickness and the fact that it comes in many different colors helps the cause of jewelry and brings variety in the jewelry. (Callaway) Fibre Hemp is also used in the production of fiber. Infect, fiber is the most important and lucrative part of the hemp plant. In technical terms, it is referred to as bast. It refers to fibers that generally grow beyond the woody interior of the stalk of plant and within the outer part of the bark. The length of hemp fiber is between 0.91 m and 4.6 m. it is generally in creamy white, black, green or even gray color. However the color it takes up depends entirely on the processing type used. In the last two centuries, hemp fiber production and has its use has declined. However before the industrial revolution it was a popular fiber because of its strength and the fact that it grows quickly. If grown on the same land, it produces ten percent more fiber than either of cotton of flax. As mentioned before it is used to make paper but is also used to construe sail canvas. The word canvas emanates from the word cannabis. A special of the hemp, the Manila hemp is a type of banana plant and has replaced its use in rope. Sacking market was taken over by Burlap, made from jute. As mentioned before, paper industry was taken over by wood pulp and the carpet industry resorted to other raw materials like wool, sisal, jute and nylon. (J. S. Callaway) Building material Hemp has also found important use and prominence in concrete blocks. Concrete blocks made of hemp and lime is now used for insulation purposes in construction. These types of blocks are not enough as structural elements and should be supported by brick, steel frame and wood. Hemp based materials have also been lucrative in producing Jewelry: Macrame is an ancient practice. Hemp jewelry is the result of this practice in which knots of hemp twine are made. Bracelets, necklaces, anklets, rings, watches and other adornments make a crucial part of jewelry made from hemp. There is some jewelry which is made from stones like glass, stone, bones and wood. The thickness of the hemp twine is inconsistent. It varies in thickness and comes in different colors. The stitches used to create hemp jewelry also vary. However the most common are the half knot and full knot stitches that are used to make hemp jewelry. Cordage: Hemp can also be used in rope making. It was used during the time of sailing ships. At that time, every rope had to be protected through tarring. Hemp rope at that time was very vulnerable and could be easily broke from the rot. Thus to protect it from breaking down, a method called tarring was employed. Tarring is basically a very labor intensive process in which the sailors earned the nickname “Jack Tar”. Hemp rope became obsolete when Manila rope became more popular. Manila rope did not require tarring and soon it became widely available. Manila is also called Manila hemp but ironically it is not associated with hemp. It is abaca, a banana species. Animal bedding Hemp is also used in the animal bedding industry. Hemp shives are central to the stem. In the EU, the shives are mostly used for animal bedding or as they call it for horticultural mulch. Industrial hemp can be very valuable if both fibres and shives are used. Soil and Water Purification: Hemp is also a valuable cleaning source. It is uses excessively to clear impurities of waste water. These are sewage effluent, excessive phosphorous from chicken litter or various other unwanted substances or chemicals that intoxicate water. Hemp was also used to clean the impurities at the time of the Chernobyl nuclear site disaster. Weed control: Hemp has been widely used to control weed. It is primarily because of its height, the density of foliage and its high planting density as a crop. Farmers mostly use it by curbing the pool of weed seeds of the soil. Using hemp can help farmers in various ways. It brings down the use of herbicides and helps one gain organic certification and to extract benefits out of crop rotation. Because of its growing characteristics, some researchers have been extremely critical of its use. They feel that it is a noxious weed which grows very rapidly. (Guide) Fuel Hemp has been very lucrative in its use as bio fuels. It is used in bio diesel and alcohol fuel. It is used to produce oils in hemp seeds and stalks and also for the fermentation of the entire plant as a whole. Hempoline is the name given to bio diesel that is produced from hemp. The biggest advantage of using hemp in these bio diesels is the fact that hemp bio diesel is clean, its non buring and its non toxic. Thus it serves as an environment friendly prospect raw material Then there is filtered hemp oil which is also very useful. This is used to power diesel engines. The first diesel engine was invented in 1892 by Rudolf Diesel. It was supposed to be fueled by a wide variety of fuels especially vegetable and seed oils which were used for oil lamps earlier on. Works Cited Alberta, Government of. Industrial Hemp Production in Canada. 12 April 2011 . Callaway. Hempseed as a nutritional resource: an overview. Euphytica, 2004. Callaway, JC, Schwab U, Harvimaa I, Halonen P, Mykkanen O, Hyvonen P & Jarvinen T. "Efficacy of dietary hempseed oil in patients with atopic dermatitis." Journal of Dermatological Treatment (2005): 87-94. Citizen, Ottawa. Green Bedrooms: Healthy Fabrics for home. 12 April 2011 . Cronin, Mary Elizabeth. "Hemp Fashions are free, comfy and Legal." The Free Lance Star (1995). Guide, THC Club: Cannabis Users. Hemp Seed & Nutrition. 4 April 2011 . jr., Gertjan van Roekel. Hemp Pulp and Paper Production. The Netherlands , 1994. Melody, Lan. "Wall Street: Edible Affordable Indulgences for 2009." The Wall Street Journal (2009). Stafford, Peter. Psychedelics Encyclopedia. Berkeley,California, 1992. Weiss, Melitta. Regional Cuisines of Medieval Europe: A Book of Essays . Adamson, 2002. Read More