by hempadmin | May 8, 2018 | CBD, Culture, Economics, Hemp Wellness
The CBD industry is quickly becoming the most Alternatively Healthy TREAD in our country since Jack LaLanne and Juicing… Economically. the CBD Industry is soaring daily. The benefits have been reported off the charts and life-changing for so many, it’s wonderful to see & know. The testimonials are amazing, from extreme inflammation reduction to pain relief, lower blood pressure, relief of Opiate and pharmaceutical addiction, even reports of people coming off Thyroid Medication and other harsh medications with side-effects that could and sometimes do, kill us. CBD – Cannabinoidoils are now available in all 50 states because it’s a non-narcotic, so it’s legal. So far it does not seem to show up in drug testing with its .03%THC…However, HempingtonPost is doing more research on this question, ‘Can straight CBD with 0.03 pass a drug test? DO we need to be worried about this?
Every BODY is different – not one size fits all
As I’m experiencing different CBD/Hemp Oil Product lines I can clearly say, our bodies seem to have all the same functional parts yet they appear to be very different in how they function. Not one size fits all and that’s true with most things in life! What may be great for me, may not be so great for You.
I say, commit to nothing until you’ve tried it out for at least 30 days or less if you don’t like how it makes you feel. I have gone from lethargic to anxious with various brands of CBD – I’m a tester, I settle for nothing. My body deserves only the best and I believe yours does too – It’s not easy finding the best CBD and we are worth the time invested in our self.
I have tried many CBD lines as I mentioned AND I love Randy’s Remedy. The taste, and for sure the feeling I get when I take the drops. Immediately I’m feeling clear, calm & creative, my three favorite ways to feel and my sleep is solid as a rock… and this is where my body feels optimal!
I encourage you if you are looking for a NON-MLM CBD that makes you feel clear & fabulous… with 03% THC, Randy’s is great and if you want to share it – they do have an affiliate program!
check out their story and try their product line – Best CBD on the Market for me – Best pricing ever, because they are not BIG Business – Check out their story at Randys CLub!
https://hempingtonpost.com/marketplace-view-all/
Randy’s Remedy – CBD Features & Benefits
PROMOTES A HEALTHY INFLAMMATORY RESPONSE
SUPPORTS THE CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM
ENHANCES CELL VITALITY
IMPROVES OVERALL QUALITY OF LIFE
Soon an Interview with Linda Struse, Pharmacologist, and Professor of Nutrition.
by hempadmin | Feb 13, 2018 | Culture, Hemp Wellness, Uncategorized
It’s a product years in the making, but Americans in 37 states can now try hemp-infused wine, the creation of Texas-based TVM Wines.
TVM’s new hemp wines are actually wine cocktails, infused with flavors like “rum and Coke” and “Texas tea,” and graced with playful names like “Forbidden,” “Covert” and “Taboo” that invite drinkers to take part in something secretive and daring. However, for the wine’s creators, the product is about more than just capitalizing on an increasingly “hip” ingredient: they’re believers in the benefits of hemp too.
“We really truly want to help people,” declared Elease Hill, vice president of sales and marketing at TVM Wines.
Each glass of hemp wine contains a full serving of hemp oil, and while Hill stops short of making any health claims about drinking the wine, there’s ample scientific evidence that hemp oil itself can provide real benefits to consumers. If Hill had her way, the wines would also include CBD oil, an extract of hemp that can offer relief to symptoms of numerous conditions from arthritis to chronic pain. However, her efforts to develop CBD-infused wine, which has already become a best-selling product in Europe were thwarted by government regulations and the ongoing war on drugs, and it took months of struggle and negotiation to even bring her hemp wines to market.
Two bottles of TVM Hemp Wines, in “Fantasy” and “Covert” flavors, are artfully posed outdoors. TVM’s Elease Hill spent months negotiating with the government in order to successfully bring hemp wine to market.
“Until the government gets off their high horse and leaves hemp alone we can’t do anything with CBD,” Hill said, with obvious frustration in her voice, when we spoke to her by phone last month.
DEA, TTB, AND THE STRUGGLE TO BRING HEMP WINE TO MARKET
Friends of the family-owned winery first suggested the idea of a hemp wine “about two years ago,” according to Hill, but her father, TVM’s chairman Ron Mittelstedt, was initially resistant due to hemp’s uncertain legal nature and lingering stigma.
The idea lingered, and soon after Hill’s sister Beth began to research hemp’s benefits. Hill herself also discovered that CBD could treat her Attention Deficit Disorder more effectively than pharmaceutical drugs. Armed with both first-hand experience and knowledge of Spain’s “Cannavine,” they were able to change their father’s opinion and began the long process of developing a new product — only to discover that there were seemingly miles of red tape in their way.
Hemp was once a staple American cash crop, and in regular use for its medicinal benefits, until it was made illegal alongside its close cousin, marijuana, in the early 20th-century. The 2014 Farm Bill legalized hemp growing in the U.S. again for “research purposes” (including market research), allowing each state to set rules around the growth of low-THC industrial hemp. Legal experts believe the farm bill, along with other legislation and legal precedents, mean that hemp-based products are fully legal in the United States.
However, the Drug Enforcement Administration continues to insist that CBD is fully illegal, and other government agencies have followed their lead.
Pres. Barack Obama signs the 2014 Farm Bill, which relegalized hemp growing in the U.S. Despite this and other legal precedents, government agencies continue to resist the sale of legal hemp products like CBD-infused hemp wine.
“When the DEA came out and said CBD is a Schedule I drug, the TTB, the Alcohol and Tobacco Trade Board, they were not going to approve any alcohol products that contain CBD unless it was in trace amounts,” Hill explained.
Without TTB approval, TVM’s products wouldn’t be assigned a “COLA number,” a crucial designation required for national distribution of alcoholic products. She soon discovered that the agency had an absurd definition of what constitutes a trace amount. At one point, the TTB rejected an earlier formula because they claimed it contained 700 parts per million of CBD, a miniscule measurement far below what could cause any effect.
Even after after agreeing to use hemp oil, rather than CBD oil, Hill still had to push for final approval. One additional challenging factor? Hemp-infused products are rare: most similar products are merely flavored with it rather than containing substantial amounts of actual hemp. One exception, which helped Hill make her case to the TTB, is Colorado High Vodka, which is actually distilled from hemp plants.
After almost two years of work, the TTB agreed to grant TVM Hemp Wines a cola number late last year. “We finally got approval actually one day before my birthday on the formulas, which is December 1st.”
The agency approved the labels later that month, and the first hemp wines went on sale in Texas stores in January.
REDUCING THE STIGMA AROUND CANNABIS, ONE GLASS OF HEMP WINE AT A TIME
The names of the hemp wines, from “Forbidden” to “Fantasy,” hint at the way cannabis has faced misunderstandings, mistrust, and persecution under the war on drugs. Hill’s struggle to receive government approval for the products, shows that the stigma around this plant is still alive even as legal barriers theoretically fall away. The early response to her wines, on the other hand, is a sign that everyday people are excited about hemp, rather than afraid of it.
A red sock monkey (don’t worry, he’s over 21!) enjoys the sweet taste of TVM’s “Forbidden” hemp wine cocktail. Consumers’ excitement over hemp wine shows the stigma around cannabis is disappearing.
“It wasn’t even on the shelves for 20 minutes and someone bought two bottles,” Hill said.
TVM’s hemp wines are already for sale — and selling fast — in several stores in Texas, with more coming soon. For the rest of us, curious hemp enthusiasts in 37 states can order the products from TVM’s page on Vinoshipper.com.
Hill isn’t done making hemp products, but she’s hoping Congress will clear up the legal confusion around hemp first. Efforts like the Industrial Hemp Farming Act, which would have fully legalized hemp and hemp products from coast to coast, have stalled in Congress so far, but advocates are hopeful that support for total legalization is growing rapidly.
“I need these bills to pass through so we can create a traditional, dry red wine with the CBD infused.”
We can’t wait to try it!
Original Blog complements of:
by hempadmin | Feb 6, 2018 | Culture, Economics, Sustainability
The Cover photo from Harmless Home of hempcrete blocks for a home project in British Columbia. The woody fibers of the cannabis plant — it grows from seed to harvest in about four months — when mixed with lime produces a natural, light concrete that retains thermal mass and is highly insulating.
By Adam Popescu, New York Times News Service – 
Sunday, Feb. 4, 2018 | 2 a.m.
The Romans have been using it since the days of Julius Caesar, but not to get high. Both Washington and Jefferson grew it.
Now that several states have legalized the use of marijuana for some recreational and medical purposes, one of the biggest untapped markets for the cannabis plant itself — at least one variety — could be as a building tool.
The most sustainable building material is not concrete or steel — it is fast-growing hemp. Hemp structures date to Roman times. A hemp mortar bridge was constructed back in the 6th century, when France was still Gaul.
Now a wave of builders and botanists are working to renew this market. Mixing hemp’s woody fibers with lime produces a natural, light concrete that retains thermal mass and is highly insulating. No pests, no mold, good acoustics, low humidity, no pesticide. It grows from seed to harvest in about four months.
A strain of the ubiquitous Cannabis sativa, the slender hemp plant is truly weedlike in its ability to flourish in a wide variety of climates, growing as high as 15 feet and nearly an inch in diameter. The plant’s inner layer, the pith, is surrounded by a woody core called the hurd. This is the source of the tough fiber, which can be used for rope, sails and paper.
Hemp is typically planted in March and May in northern climes, or between September and November below the equator. Once cut, usually by hand, plants are left to dry for a few days before they’re bundled and dumped into vats of water, which swells the stalks. Those dried fibers are then blended for a variety of uses, such as adding lime. This creates blocklike bricks known as hempcrete.
Industrial hemp contains a mere 0.3 percent of THC (tetrahydrocannabinol), the substance responsible for the buzz when smoking weed. The cannabis present at a reggae fest, for instance, contains as much as 20 percent.
The two strains look different, too. Hemp’s sativa is taller; the shorter indica has resiny trichomes accounting for its psychoactive power. The rule goes: the better the budding flower, the poorer the hemp.
Also unlike pot, you cannot grow hemp in an indoor hydroponics setup; the plant’s deep roots need to spread, so outdoor cultivation is required. The plant’s seeds and leaves can be eaten raw, dried into powder or pressed into oils.
Getting a mature plant in just a few months — with less fertilizer than needed for industrial crops like corn, and without chemical fertilizers or bug sprays — makes the potential for profit huge. As hemp taps water underground, its long roots circulate air, which improves soil quality — another boon for farmers looking to rotate crops.
Battling the plant’s powerful drug connotation might be the toughest hurdle for farmers and builders, and is possibly a more formidable obstacle during the Trump administration. The plant is still highly regulated.
This January, though, California legalized use of the plant in full. And the federal farm legislation of 2014 legalized hemp’s cultivation for research purposes in universities in states where it has been approved by law. New York now funds a research initiative for as much as $10 million in grants toward hemp businesses, with participation in the pilot program from institutions that include Cornell University.
Still, in the United States special permits are needed to build with hemp, and the requirements can vary by county and state. The first modern hemp house was constructed in 2010, in North Carolina. There are now about 50 such homes in the country.
But not much hemp is grown here; a little less than 10,000 acres so far, enough for about 5,000 single-family homes. Cultivated acreage in Canada is double that, and in China’s Yunnan province, 10,000 farmers grow it. Roughly 30 nations now produce hemp, including Spain, Austria, Russia and Australia.
Hemp was rediscovered in the 1980s across Europe, where cultivation is legal, and France has became the European Union’s largest hemp producer. Hundreds of buildings across the continent use the substance as insulation to fill walls and roofs, and under floors in wood-framed buildings.
Manufacturers say it is ideal for low-rise construction, a product that is stuccolike in appearance and toxin-free. Its promoters also boast that it has a lower carbon footprint, requiring three times less heat to create than standard limestone concrete.
More like drywall than concrete, hempcrete cannot be used for a foundation or structure; it is an insulation that needs to breathe, said Joy Beckerman, a hemp law specialist and vice president of the Hemp Industries Association, a trade group.
Hemp should not be used at ground level, or it loses its resistance to mold and rot. Lime plaster coatings or magnesium oxide boards have to be applied to anything touching hempcrete, or the lime will calcify it and lose its ability to absorb and release water.
While that sounds like a lot of work, Beckerman pointed to the long-term payoff.
“In many climates, a 12-foot hempcrete wall will facilitate approximately 60-degrees indoor temperatures year-around without heating or cooling systems,” she said. “The overall environmental footprint is dramatically lower than traditional construction.”
There still are not international standards for building with hemp, or codes regulating how it should be used structurally or safely. ASTM International, a technical standards organization, formed a committee to address this in 2017.
Nonetheless, the use of hempcrete is spreading. A Washington state company is retrofitting homes with it. Left Hand Hemp in Denver completed the first permitted structure in Colorado last year. There’s Hempire in Ukraine, Inno-Ventures in Nepal. Israel’s first hemp house was constructed in March on the slopes of Mount Carmel.
Down south, New Zealanders turned 500 bales of Dutch hemp into a property that fetched around $650,000. In Britain, HAB Housing built five homes with hempcrete last year. Canada’s JustBioFiber recently completed a house on Vancouver Island with an interlocking internal framed hemp-block inspired by Legos.
It is a niche but growing sector of the cannabis market. In 2015, the Hemp Industries Association estimated the retail market at $573 million in the United States.
“When I started Hempitecture in 2013 and presented the concept, venture capitalists laughed at the idea,” said Matthew Mead, the founder of Hempitecture, a construction firm in Washington. “Now there are over 25 states with pro-hemp amendments and legislation, and the federal farm bill has its own provision supporting the development of research toward industrial hemp.”
One major issue is cultivation. Although it has been legal to grow hemp in Canada since 1998, farmers need to apply for licenses. In Australia, industrial hemp agriculture has been legal for more than 20 years.
In the United States, a provision in the farm bill removed hemp grown for “research purposes” from the Controlled Substances Act. Farmers and researchers in more than a dozen states can now import hemp seeds. The Industrial Hemp Farming Act, pending in the House for the seventh time, would exempt hemp plants in toto from the controlled substance designation, an Olympic leap toward a burgeoning agro-business.
Much like the “pot-repreneurs” who set up marijuana dispensaries a decade ago, before laws were definitive, a generation is pushing ahead despite uncertainties.
Sergiy Kovalenkov, 33, a Ukrainian civil engineer who spent the last three years building hemp structures and consulting on projects in Ukraine, France, Sweden and Jamaica, is beginning a project in California. The hardest steps, Kovalenkov said, are paperwork, permits and seeds.
“Building codes vary from state to state, with regulations in terms of fire and seismic activities,” he said. “If we’re talking sustainable product, seeds cannot come from Poland or France. It has to come from California.”
Only one facility in the United States processes hemp stocks, in North Carolina. Kovalenkov’s firm, Hempire USA, has also devised its own fiber separation system. “The demand is going to be quite big in the next three to five years,” Kovalenkov said.
But what does a hemp house smell like?
“It smells like comfort,” Kovalenkov said, laughing. “It smells a little like lime. We’re using the stock. You cannot smell cannabis — it has nothing to do with smoking weed or cannabis plants. It’s an industrial agriculture crop.”
In October, representatives from 14 countries attended the seventh annual Hemp Building Symposium at the International Hemp Building Association in Quebec. Terry Radford, the president of JustBioFiber Structural Solutions, an IT-pro-turned-tinkerer, unveiled a prefab hemp composite that could be more attractive to city planners and government building code officials.
“The problem with hempcrete right now,” he said, “is each one has to be inspected and have an exemption from the building code. It’s difficult for builders to get approved. If you’re trying to get a mortgage on your house, it’s pretty restrictive. That’s our biggest challenge.”
“Our idea is to get the material certified by building coders, rather than have each one approved,” he added. “The difference between hempcrete and my block product is that we’re a structural product. Hempcrete by itself is just an insulation.” The startup is preparing to produce a 112,000-square-foot facility in British Columbia.
Mead, the head of Hempitecture, echoes the concerns of others. For farmers to expand, he said, the infrastructure has to be there. Without a network to process materials, “it will be difficult for farmers to know if they can grow this crop and turn a profit.”
HempingtonPost.com is a media source presenting the most current & trusted Global HEMP/Cannabis Information
Reposted from the Las Vegas SUN – HarmlessHome & the New York TIMES
by hempadmin | Dec 14, 2017 | Culture, Hemp Wellness
HOW AND WHY YOUR BRAIN MAKES ITS OWN CANNABINOIDS
The Endocannabinoid System (ECS) -by Anne Marie, HempEdification
As you probably already know, unlike water, alcohol and many top-selling pharmaceuticals, it’s impossible to overdose on Cannabis. What you might not realize, however, is that this remarkable attribute of Cannabis stems in part from the fact the human body actually produces its own ‘endogenous’ (made in the body) cannabinoids (endocannabinoids).
Cannabinoids, whether formed in the brain or inhaled via a vaporiser for example, fit neatly into a series of specialised receptors located throughout the body, with their greatest concentration in: the hippocampus (regulates memory); the cerebral cortex (cognition); the cerebellum (motor coordination); the basal ganglia (movement); the hypothalamus (appetite); and, the amygdala (emotions). Cannabinoid receptors are similarly found in “every animal species down to the sponge”, said Dr Donald Abrams, Professor of Clinical Medicine at the University of California San Francisco, Chief of Hematology / Oncology at San Francisco General Hospital and a leading medical Cannabis researcher.
Dr Abrams was speaking about cannabinoid receptors and the potential therapeutic benefits of THC in children with serious illnesses. When compared to the side effects of other drugs commonly prescribed to kids with cancer, the decision of parents to administer highly-concentrated Cannabis oil to their sick children seems to be a better choice.
First identified in the late 1980’s, the Endocannabinoid System (ECS) consists of cannabinoid (CB1) receptors predominantly located in the nervous system, connective tissues, gonads, glands and organs; and cannabinoid (CB2) receptors, primarily found in the immune system and the spleen, liver, heart, kidneys, bones, blood vessels, lymph cells, endocrine glands and reproductive organs. These receptors can be stimulated and modulated by compounds called endocannabinoids that are produced naturally in the body, like anandamide (ananda is the Sanskrit word for bliss); by ingesting a set of closely-related botanically-based phytocannabinoids like tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), Cannabis’ best known and most psychoactive compound; or by ingesting synthetic cannabinoids produced in a laboratory. After binding to receptors in the body that fit them like a lock fits a key, these endo, phyto and synthetic cannabinoids all produce a wide range of physiological effects, altering everything from blood pressure to pain response to memory to appetite to consciousness.
“The endogenous cannabinoid system, named after the plant that led to its discovery, is perhaps the most important physiologic system involved in establishing and maintaining human health”, Dr Dustin Sulak, a leading practitioner of what some have dubbed ‘cannabinopathic medicine’, said during a lecture at the 2010 NORML convention. “In each tissue, the cannabinoid system performs different tasks. But the goal is always the same: homeostasis, the maintenance of a stable internal environment despite fluctuations in the external environment”. Think of the ECS as your body’s ‘root level’ operating system, a kind of central processing unit that regulates and alters the functioning of many other important systems and keeps them in balance.
Martin Lee, author of, ‘Smoke Signals: A Social History of Marijuana’, notes cannabinoid receptors are more abundant in the brain than any other type of neurotransmitter receptor and “function as subtle sensing devices, tiny vibrating scanners perpetually primed to pick up biochemical cues that flow through fluids surrounding each cell … When tickled by THC or its endogenous cousins, these receptors trigger a cascade of biochemical changes on a cellular level that puts the brakes on excessive physiological activity. Endocannabinoids are the only neurotransmitters that engage in such ‘retrograde signaling’ a form of intracellular communication that inhibits immune response, reduces inflammation, relaxes musculature, lowers blood pressure, dilates bronchial passages and normalizes overstimulated nerves. Retrograde signaling serves as an inhibitory feedback mechanism that tells other neurotransmitters to ‘cool it’ when they are firing too fast”.
In a 2006 study published in Pharmacological Review, National Institute of Health researcher Pal Pacher, M.D., Ph.D explained the cognitive leap that took place.
“In the past decade, the Endocannabinoid System (ECS) has been implicated in a growing number of physiological functions, both in the central and peripheral nervous systems and in peripheral organs. Modulating the activity of the Endocannabinoid System (ECS) turned out to hold therapeutic promise in a wide range of disparate diseases and pathological conditions, ranging from mood and anxiety disorders, movement disorders such as Parkinson’s and Huntington’s disease, neuropathic pain, multiple sclerosis and spinal cord injury, to cancer, atherosclerosis, myocardial infarction, stroke, hypertension, glaucoma, obesity/metabolic syndrome and osteoporosis, to name just a few”.
But what happens when you purposefully disrupt the body’s ability to stimulate the ECS? Things can go haywire, as discovered when ‘Big Pharma’ tested Rimonabant, an anti-obesity drug designed to create a kind of ‘reverse munchies’ by preventing cannabinoids (endo or phyto) from binding to CB1 and CB2 receptors. Those enrolled in a planned 33-month study of Rimonabant did report lower overall appetite when taking the drug, but they also demonstrated an increased risk of suicide so pronounced that the study was abandoned after little more than a year and four suicides! “Patients taking Rimonabant reported feeling severely depressed and having serious thoughts about committing suicide”, Psychology Today reported. “It was as though the patients had lost their ability to experience pleasure… [Which] tells neuroscientists that our endogenous marijuana* system is normally involved, either directly or indirectly, in controlling our mood and allowing us to experience pleasure; antagonizing the actions of this chemical in the brain leads to depression with possibly dangerous consequences”.
Researching the Truth about Cannabis and Hemp
And yes, here’s hoping for a very hempy celebration season – AnnMaria HempEdification http://hempedification.blogspot.com/
