Governor Haslam signed a bill into law (SB2495) that takes effect July 1, starting the process to allow private farms to legally grow hemp in Tennessee once regulatory details have been worked out.  It is not clear at this point where the market opportunities would be for locally produced industrial hemp.  Some folks are still not sure how they feel about it, but industrial hemp is a crop that is being considered for fiber production to make rope, fabric and plastic substitutes. Industrial hemp is closely related to marijuana but has only a very small amount of THC compared to marijuana plants.  Because it is visually similar to marijuana, it will be a highly regulated crop, and only permitted growers will legally be able to obtain seed and produce a crop.  More information should be available this summer as the TDA and the DEA sort out the permitting procedure and other regulations, including how fields will be checked in order to manage against potentially illegal situations.  The details are supposed to be worked out over the next few months, but this will likely make it too late to successfully plant a crop this summer.

Research is ongoing in Kentucky as some universities there have started to look at things like cultivar adaptation and fertility requirements and those results should be made available later this winter.