by
Paul
BenhaimLarge quantities of the world’s paper was made from hemp until
about 1850. Since the 1900s all newspapers and most books and
magazines have been printed on wood-pulp paper- cheap
throwaway paper, fitting in with a modern disposable economy.
Our forests are being cut down three times as fast as they can
grow.
Hemp paper does not need chlorine bleach, which heavily pollutes
rivers near wood-pulp paper mills.
Environmentally sound hemp paper is stronger, finer and longer
lasting than wood based papers.
Hemp paper is used for bank notes and archives.
‘You would have to smoke at least a field of this stuff to even get a
smile,’ said Mr Mouse.
‘The earliest known woven fabric was apparently of Hemp, which
began to be worked in the eighth millennium (8,000-7,000 BC)’
says Columbia History of the World 1981.
For more than one thousand years before the time of Christ, and
until 1883 AD, cannabis/hemp was our planet’s largest agricultural
crop. It was the most important industry for thousands of products
and enterprises, producing the overall majority of the earth’s fibre,
fabric, lighting oil, paper, incense and medicines, as well as being
the primary source of protein for humans and animals alike.
Hemp seed oil is said to burn the brightest of all lamp oils and has
been used since the days of Abraham. Scythians used to purify
and cleanse themselves with hemp oil, which made their skin
‘shining and clean’.
Until the early 1800s the word ‘linen’ described any coarse fabric
made from hemp or flax.