2024-08-03 06:34:42
BOLZANO. “We ask for the amendment to be modified, which damages all those companies that have legitimately invested in hemp.” This is what was said Gianluca Barbacovi, number one of Coldiretti of Trentino Alto Adige. The amendment to the Security Billapproved by the Constitutional Affairs and Justice Committees of the Chamber, which provides for the crackdown on light cannabis on a par with non-light cannabis, puts at risk the survival of an entire sector engaged in a cultivation where significant investments have been made.
“For this reason – says the president of Coldiretti Trentino Alto Adige – we are asking for changes to an amendment that damages our agricultural companies. We also have in the province companies that grow hemp, distributed in a large part of the territory such as Val di Sole, Val Rendena, Valle dei Laghi, Val di Fassa”.
“These crops represent an additional opportunity to diversify production, but also to meet the demands of medical prescriptions that indicate hemp for therapeutic purposes. In fact, the inflorescence of hemp represents a fundamental part of the added value of the plant, and prohibiting its harvesting and drying risks causing the collapse of an entire sector in which many young farmers are involved”.
Coldiretti had repeatedly expressed the need for protection for farmers who produce hemp in full legality, as also recognized by European legislation, also to respond to markets such as those of nutraceuticals, cosmetics, industry or furniture.
“This amendment – continues Barbacovi – which as mentioned, removes the possibility of collecting, using and drying the inflorescence, also blocks exports to foreign markets that represent a large slice of our market, cutting Italian companies completely out of competition at a European level. Now a productive sector that employs thousands of people and cultivates around 4 thousand hectares is being put at risk”.
Coldiretti finally recalls that until the 1940s hemp was more than familiar in Italy, so much so that the Belpaese with almost 100 thousand hectares was the second largest producer in the world behind only the Soviet Union, then the decline due to the progressive industrialization and the advent of the “economic boom” that imposed synthetic fibers on the market.
2024-08-03 06:34:42