Hemp Products

Posted on January 28, 2012

Hemp is considered one of the most versatile plants on Earth for production of various products. Due to its many favorable qualities, it is a fitting material for a range of industries.

Food Products From Hemp Seeds

The seeds of hemp can be eaten raw as is, or ground into a meal. It is also possible to make hemp milk which is similar to soy milk. In addition, fresh hemp leaves can be mixed in salads.

Within the industry, we can find various food products based on hemp, such as cereals or nut butters. In North America, hemp seed food products can be typically found in health food stores; they are also increasingly available for order on the Internet. The market itself of hemp food products is currently limited, with growing potential as more people become aware of the positive traits of the plant. In Europe, most of the hemp seeds sold are targeted for animal feeding.

In terms of nutrition, hemp is considered very healthy. Around 44% of its weight are healthy edible oils, with around 80% of those being essential fatty acids. About 10% of its fat content is saturated, while the rest 90% is divided between monounsaturated (10%) and polyunsaturated fat (80%). Hempseed also contains dietary fiber, calcium and iron. It is safe to consume for people unable to tolerate nuts, gluten, lactose, or sugar.

Fiber Products

The hemp’s fiber is considered the most valuable part of the plants, and is commonly also termed bast. This term mostly refers to the fibers growing on the outside of plant’s stalk, and under the bark.

As Building Material

As building material, also known by the portmanteau hempcrete, hemp is often mixed with lime and used for insulation in construction. In itself, this material is not considered robust enough to support a building, and is usually augmented with frames of wood or steal. When compared to cement, it is less brittle and thus does not require expansion joints; nevertheless, its general strength is around 20 times lower than that of low quality concrete, which explains why it needs a support frame.

Plastic Production

Considered a relatively new product on the market, while being in fact much older, plastic is produced from hemp fiber when combined with other materials such as fiberglass. Hemp plastic developments have taken place in Europe since over 15 years, but today it is mostly produced in China. Historically, hemp plastic production (on a small scale) reaches to the earlier decades of the 20th century. Hemp plastic material was originally allegedly testified to be a lot stronger than steel.

As Paper

As paper, hemp has a long and extensive history of production, starting in the early Western Han Dynasty in China, which translates to around the 2nd century BCE, resulting in a history timeline of over two millennia. In the US, hemp paper was made at the beginning of the 20th century by scientists of the Federal Government. Paper products of hemp are typically used for pulp, as cigarette paper. In this process, hemp fiber is usually mixed with fiber of other sources.

Jewelry, Farbic and Ropes

Hemp can be also utilized to produce jewelry, the result of knotting hemp in different fashions. The most common technique is macrame, a form of knotting together rather than knitting or weaving.

In the clothing industry, hemp can be a potential rival to cotton, being warmer and generally more water resistant. There is a growing industry of alternative clothing, mostly available on the Internet, offering clothes made of hemp for reasonable or normal market prices. Typically, hemp clothing products are marketed as ‘green’ (as the cultivation of hemp is generally more environment friendly than that of cotton). Hemp clothing is often associated with the fair trade industry, and some online shops offer not only basic clothing, but also hemp bags, yarn, accessories such as wallets or belts, bags, as well as animal toys or curiosities such as tea towels.

Hemp has a long and extensive history being used in rope making, especially sailing ropes. In the age of sail, from the 16th century to the mid 19th century, hemp has been commonly used in ships as rope. In this function, it often had to be tarred in order to avoid it breaking internally from decomposition. Hemp rope was generally replaced with so-called Manila hemp products (which are not based on hemp), not requiring any tarring.

Hempseed Oil

When the seeds of the hemp are pressed or crushed, a very valuable form of oil can produced, commonly available medicinally and in various body care products.

Miscellaneous Small-Scale Use as Well as Trivia

In Europe, hemp shives may be used for animal bedding. Generally, there have been examples of hemp being used to purify soil or water by means of absorbing sewage after having been treated at a sewage treatment plant. This type of function is often titled ‘mop crop’, as the hemp ‘mops up’ the dangerous substances or chemicals.

As part of being a ‘cleaning plant’, Hemp has been used as an organic method to control and combat tough weeds in farming, helping farmers avoid using pollutive or expansive pesticides. The way of treatment is often in the form of so-called crop rotation; every one or more cycles, the actual crop is rotated with hemp which cleanses the soil.

Hemp was also used for centuries to produce lamp oil. In this function, it was gradually phased out in the United States in the late 19th, with the introduction of petroleum.

There have been some curious uses of hemp throughout history, and at least one is worth mentioning. In the 1940s, Henry Ford designed and produced an entire car made of hemp plastic, the so-called Soybean car. The car itself ran on ethanol produced by corn. Today, it is not entirely known if the car was actually made of hemp, but there is a general consensus that it was produced from a combination of soybeans, wheat, flax and hemp.

Posted in Hemp