A Hemp Revolution

 

Hemp, or cannabis, is one of the most medicinal and versatile plants on the planet. With over 50,000 known uses and counting, we have cultivated and used this plant for over 6000 years.  Hemp has been used as a source of food, medicine, cosmetic, fibre and construction material. Recently it has even been used to make biodegradable plastics and biofuels.

Hemp is a variety of cannabis with a very low level of the psychoactive compound THC. In recent years this compound has been demonised and the use of the plant as a whole reduced drastically. 

 

As part of the hemp farm cooperative Hempen, i'm hoping to reignite the peoples love for this plant and all it can do to help us. This really is a peoples plant and one that has served us for thousands of years.

 

 

Here I will focus on the medicine and food aspects as I believe growing your own food and medicine is one of the most powerful and radical things you can do.

 

Now, the medicine from this plant comes from compounds known as cannabinoids. We create small amounts of our own cannabinoids that interact with our endcannabinoid system. This system is responsible for the homeostasis of all other major systems in the body. So when something causes an imbalance, we produce cannabinoids to help the endocannabinoid system restore our health and wellbeing. However, and here's the caveat, we do not produce enough on our own. We need to get it from external sources. 

Cue the cannabis plant! The highest known source of cannabinoids available to us. The entire plant is edible and luckily once left to grow, they grow in abundance!

 

The effect of cannabis on our endocannibanoid system is why the plant can be used for so many things ranging from anxiety and stress, to immunity, gut health, hormone regulation, pain sensitivity, digestion and even brain function.

 

 

Currently in the UK you are not allowed to grow hemp unless you are a farmer with a license. Hopefully, with more people learning about hemp we can change this.

Growing hemp also has benefits on the planet as hemp absorbs between 4-10x more CO2 than trees, and can even regenerate polluted soil helping to return it to organic land. As we know our soil health is drastically declining but as everything grows from the soil up, it needs to be a priority.

 

  

For more information on this life changing plant and to understand further why it needs to brought back to the people, view my full plant monograph here.

 

Much love, Em xxx