If the attendance and engagement at last week’s Big Horn Basin Hemp Connect Forum at the Park County Fairgrounds is any indication, there’s a lot of interest in the region for the emerging hemp industry.

The event brought out about 75 people to hear several speakers with a range of experience and knowledge growing and processing hemp products, building markets and financing ventures.

While the experts spoke positively of the industry’s potential, they also cautioned those interested to carefully manage their expectations.

“You want to start slow, and the reason for that is we’re building a new industry. And this is kind of new to all of us. And there’s going to be a lot of opportunity to stub your toe,” Monte Robinson, founder of the Colorado-based processor San Louis Valley Hemp Company, advised the forum’s attendees.

Regulations

Last month, the USDA released its interim final rules for hemp regulation in the U.S. The Wyoming Department of Agriculture had previously submitted its own rules to the feds for regulating the industry in the state, and the department is now in the process of reviewing the USDA’s rules to determine what changes are needed to come in line with superseding federal regulations.

It remains illegal to grow hemp in Wyoming for now. However, anticipating that the legal framework will be in place to issue permits by next year’s growing season, Powell Economic Partnership organized the forum to begin educating and networking potential growers, processors and investors on how to go about building a hemp industry in the state.

There’s a lot to figure out, and those unknowns will present a number of challenges for producers. Currently, there are no herbicides or pesticides approved for use with hemp, for one example. More importantly, there are no processing facilities, which is a problem for many agricultural products in Wyoming. Shipping to facilities increases costs, and with hemp there are interstate transportation regulations that impede processing at out-of-state facilities.

“We want to make sure we’re processing here in the Basin,” said Christine Bekes, executive director of PEP. “People can grow anything, but if we can’t get it to market, we’re going to be in the same boat that we always are.”

Powell Police Chief Roy Eckerdt spoke on the challenges law enforcement will have in distinguishing between hemp and marijuana, an illicit variation of the same plant that contains higher levels of the psychoactive substance tetrahydrocannabinol (THC). Eckerdt urged the need to keep the two clearly separate and not blur the lines between the two products, even suggesting hemp should not use the metric system for weights, as “kilos” are how drug smugglers refer to their products.

“Be aware of the language that you use,” the chief said. “If it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, it’s a duck. I’m not anti-hemp. I’m not afraid of hemp. I’m afraid of a wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

He also referred to a conversation at the forum he overheard about someone shipping hemp from Montana to Colorado, suggesting it was transported through Wyoming, which would still be illegal and potentially treated just like interstate smuggling of marijuana.

USDA regulations require that labs testing hemp (to certify the plant is below a 0.3 percent threshold of THC) will need to be registered with the Drug Enforcement Administration, a detail not in the state’s plan. 

“Our law enforcement is really a critical player, because ... the DEA has a little bit more input than we anticipated,” Bekes said, thanking Eckerdt for coming to the forum.

Gold rush

Robertson, with SLV Hemp, has been growing hemp in Colorado since 2014 and was one of the first producers licensed in the state. At the beginning of his operation, he went to the bank to open an account for the business. Due to federal regulations at the time — which equated hemp with marijuana — he was turned down.

“That was hurdle number one. I’ve lost track how many there’s been since then,” he told the audience.

For Wyoming to develop its hemp industry, it’s going to need to develop markets, Robertson said. Many producers rushed into Colorado’s hemp industry, he said, only to find they had nowhere to sell their produce. Many weren’t even sure how to harvest the crop. Robertson cautioned Big Horn Basin producers against producing until they’ve found a market, which is not an easy thing to develop.

“That takes a long time and a lot of money. Just be aware of that,” he warned.

With the agriculture industry struggling, Robertson said it’s going to be tempting for producers to seize upon the opportunity, which is often being oversold. That’s especially true when it comes to CBD, he said, a compound in hemp said to have health properties but without the psychoactive properties of THC. 

“There’s a gold rush out there, and it’s easy to get caught up in the gold rush,” Robertson said.

However, he didn’t dismiss the industry’s value and untapped potential. As an example, he pointed to a car in the 1930s, whose exterior was produced with fibers from hemp. He spoke of a video showing Henry Ford slamming a fender with a hammer, which produces no dent. There’s a range of products from food to oil to textiles, all with potential markets.

Robertson advised producers to start small, share information with others, and follow the rules.

Justin Loeffler, co-owner of Wyoming-based GreenTree Ag, discussed precision agriculture trials he did. The trials were planted in an area where they expected to get about 2.5 inches of rain. They ended up having four major weather events that season, he said, accumulating 11.9 inches of precipitation in a single month.

“We got devastated. We had plants floating down the road,” he said.

However, the plants all came back from this disaster, speaking to the plant’s reputation as a hardy crop.

Seaton Smith, co-owner of Gluten Free Oats in Powell, said his facility is ready to become a hemp food producer. As part of his business, Smith travels to large food conventions, and he said the hemp-related breakout sessions are standing room only.

“There is a demand for it,” Smith said, but he said processing facilities are a vital piece that needs to be in place first.

Certified seeds

Mike Moore, manager of the Wyoming Seed Certification Service, talked about the struggles the service will face as it tries to create standards for certifying seeds.

In order to create reliable certification standards for seed producers, the service will have to control for cross-contamination. The fields will need to have wide rows for inspectors to walk through, and the fields will need a few years in which no hemp is planted on them. They will also have to be separated from neighboring hemp fields to prevent cross contamination.

The service, Moore said, has been reaching out to other states with more developed hemp industries to try to work out the standards, but it’s all new territory.

“There’s so much I wish we knew,” Moore said.

The issue of securing a reliable source of seeds was discussed by a few of the speakers.

Loeffler said in their trials, they planted 11 different varieties of hemp to see what would come up.

“The vast majority of those weren’t even what they were supposed to be,” Loeffler said.

Scott Schwab is a producer from Oregon and co-founder of METT, a company involved in a range of activities within the hemp industry. He warned Wyoming producers that they’ll have people coming to them with mason jars full of seeds, promising great outcomes.

“I wish we’d have attended some meetings like this when we got started,” Schwab said.

Moore said, although they are still figuring this out, producers can call the Wyoming Seed Certification Service with questions.

Bekes collected notecards from attendees on which they could write questions and concerns to be presented to the Department of Agriculture as they refine the state’s plan. She said a number of attendees stayed long after the forum presentations to network and share plans and ideas.

“PEP is certainly here for support and to connect our agribusinesses as needed,” Bekes said.