Last of two parts
The first part is at thevoice.us/traditional-hemp-economies-a-revival-for-native-peoples
Here is a post-petroleum transition plan:
Winona LaDuke writes the following article for YES Magazine: Tribes revive traditional hemp economies:
“For the past five years, I’ve been a hemp farmer, with permits from the state government of Minnesota. My business is called Winona’s Hemp, and our research partner is Anishinaabe Agriculture. In 2020, we grew 20 acres of fiber hemp, and are working with that hemp to create a local economy. We send off our high-quality, field-retted hemp to processors to make cloth for canvas textiles. Our plan is to restore a hemp economy without a lot of chemicals and fossil fuels. The traditional history of hemp is without fossil fuels. We’d like to do as much to restore that practice as possible, focused on appropriate technology, equity, and innovation.
“Our focus has been in fiber varieties, with an interest in reducing any fossil fuel use in production and in processing. We’ve sourced varieties from Canada and Europe, with the help of Patagonia and our friends at the Lift Economy. We grew those seeds in fields on and around the White Earth Reservation. We did our best to plant with organic fertilizers, using fish emulsion and horse manure to build our soils. We learned from our experience and by talking to as many folks as possible.
“That said, we have a lot of experience here in small field crops, horse cultivation, and traditional varieties. We grew in small plots, hand seeded, and in a larger 20-acre plot, mechanically harvested with 40-year-old equipment.
“We put in a field with horses because some of our partnerships here involve not only our horse-drawn agriculture, but those of our Amish neighbors. We’ve come to collaborate, because we have similar interests in terms of technology and geography.
“We provided seeds to tribes throughout the region, all interested in the same questions: How do you grow it? And, what can you do with it?
“What we found is that the plant will teach you: Don’t be in a rush. We are re-creating an industry from the seed to the product—whether smokable or for manufacturing. Some tribes are looking at materials-processing, to include car parts and bags, others are looking at hempcrete, an improvement on concrete because of its sustainability and the fact that it is a carbon sink.
“There’s a lot of room in the New Green Revolution. After all, if you are going to change the materials economy—well, the whole economy—you will need a lot of producers and some folks in manufacturing. That’s the goal. Indeed, if hemp’s potential is realized, we can transform the materials economy, and that’s revolutionary. That’s our work now, to investigate, vet, and find technologies and economic models that can be replicated.
“And though tribes have been reluctant to get into the hemp and cannabis industry, particularly under the Trump era, there’s a growing interest among Native people in this new Green Revolution.
“The Wisconsin-based Oneida tribe, strategically situated near Green Bay, Wis., points to a growing market for hempcrete, and hemp hurd, which can be used for insulation.
“The Sisseton Tribe, based in present-day South and North Dakota, has been growing hemp for two years in collaboration with researchers from the University of Minnesota. They’re looking at fiber hemp for a composite bag facility, such as shopping bags. The tribe has an industrial facility on the reservation, and rail access.
“Diné textile artists are exploring hemp fiber with their Churro sheep wool to make a new specialty textile. The Oatman family from the Nez Perce reservation launched a magazine, Tribal Hemp and Cannabis, focused on tribal hemp and cannabis.
“The Tudinu, or Desert People in Las Vegas, Nev. have a little colony downtown, a mile from the Strip. In l970, they were federally-recognized because the Las Vegas Paiutes, and in 2017, opened the NuWu Cannabis Marketplace. That’s a big deal, because the tribe runs the only cannabis lounge in downtown Las Vegas. They may not have much land, but they have a big dispensary.
“Tribes are in a unique position. Tribal sovereignty provides their governments leeway in the development of cannabis policies and will be a stabilizing force in turbulent times. Today, confusing regulations and lucrative growth in the cannabis industry set a complex scene, but tribal nations are in a position to continue a course they set.
“Tribes have the potential to revolutionize the industry. We have the land, we just need a bit of time, technology, and finances. This is an opportunity for justice—social and ecological—in this post-petroleum economic transition. And we are ready to go, LaDuke wrote.
Winona LaDuke is an internationally-renowned writer, speaker, activist, focusing on Indigenous rights, environmental justice, and sustainable tribal economies. She is executive director of Honor The Earth, founder of the White Earth Land Recovery Project, and a former two-time vice presidential candidate. LaDuke is a YES Magazine! contributing editor.