Project P.E.A.C.E. - Revaluating Cannabis

<$Project P.E.A.C.E. -- Planet Ecology Advancing Conscious Economics$>

Catena Report

The essay below is specific to the recommendation made in the Catena report, to study other uses
of prohibited plants. The point is that Cannabis is an herb, not a drug. Attempts by
pharmaceutical companies to mimic its healing benefit have produced drugs that are unavailable to
most of the people in the world, less effective and more expensive than the herbal remedy already
growing in many people's gardens all over the world.

People will continue to grow Cannabis because they need it for a variety of reasons, not just for
its therapeutic benefit, and it is generally accepted that the responsible use of it is relatively
benign. Inestimable degeneration of health and disruption of environmental synchrony is inherent
to essential resource scarcity being induced by prohibition of the world's most useful plant.

"At What Cost?" refers to unaccountable pain, illness and death imposed by the stagnant atmosphere
of prolonged resource misvaluation, saturated with rhetoric that is essential to perpetuating
prohibition of what is in fact an unique and essential agricultural crop.

This is offered for whatever good it may do in stengthening our argument, claiming our natural,
spiritually legitimate right to grow "every herb bearing seed," for personal and industrial uses.

The cumulative harm done to individuals and society is in large part, the result of failure to
distinguish between herbs and drugs. The effect of this obvious mistake is so immense that it
appears to have escaped critical review by sheer force of magnitude.

The question, "How can the UN claim to be responsibly addressing conditions of world hunger, when
the planet's best source of vegetable protein is being made scarce by prohibition?"

What follows attempts to substantiate the most fundamental and broadly compelling rationale for
reclaiming our freedom to farm sustainably, using proven best practices. This would be a giant
step toward credible and balanced environmental, economic, and social policies.

Naturally, I welcome any comments or suggestions people may care to send.

Best wishes for our common future,

Paul J. von Hartmann

Project P.E.A.C.E.
Planet Ecology Advancing Conscious Economics

http://www.webspawer.com/users/projectpeace

========================

"At What Cost, Prohibition?"
Paul J. von Hartmann
14 February 2005

"Cannabis in silvus primum natum est."
"Hemp is the first-born of the forests."- Pliny

The greatest failure of current global agricultural and food security policy is not commonly
discussed in the context of farming issues. By failing to distinguish between "drugs" and "herbs"
the most tragic cost of the drug war has been the nutritional impoverishment of the world and the
crippling of organic agriculture.

Literally billions of people have been killed by intransigent, counter-productive prohibitionist
policies. A recent report by UNICEF estimated that one third of the people in the world are
suffering physiological misdevelopment resulting from malnutrition. Both micronutrient and protein
deficiencies play a large role in this shameful and needless catastrophe.

Hemp seed is the best, and potentially the most available source of organic vegetable protein on
Earth. Cannabis is also the only common seed with three essential fatty acids (EFAs) in proper
proportion for long-term consumption. (1) Because it is unique and essential, Cannabis seed
protein is in the same category as salt, and other foods that provide nutrients we must eat for
optimum health and proper physical development.

"The essential fatty acids are truly the welding link in nutritional health. Simple deficiencies
can cause symptoms which may be mistaken for major systemic diseases such as diabetes. Essential
fatty acids provide many health-giving properties which positively impact human vitality. Their
myriad benefits include regulating blood pressure, nourishing the immune system, controlling
inflammation in the body, and preventing the formation of abnormal blood clots." (4)

It has been estimated that seventy-five percent of the diseases that are likely to kill people
living in developed countries are the result of fat degeneration at the cellular level. EFAs have
been proven to be effective in preventing and successfully treating diseases of fat degeneration.
Proteins perform many vital functions in our bodies and are the building blocks of healthy cell
walls. (1)

The result of prolonged, grossly inaccurate and biased characterizations of Cannabis (a.k.a. hemp,
'marijuana') is that appreciation of the unique and essential nutritional properties of Cannabis
seed has been suppressed, over-looked and all but forgotten. Most disturbingly, Cannabis seed has
been ignored by those institutions whose responsibility it is to enforce treaties that are
supposed to provide for the common good. The most useful and potentially abundant agricultural
resource on Earth has been made scarce by a costly and counter-productive "drug war" being waged
by the United States government and the United Nations.

That the U.S. government and the U.N. Food & Agriculture Organization have failed to acknowledge
the true nutritional value of Cannabis seed, and are actively discouraging its cultivation is a
betrayal of public trust on a scale that is incomprehensible. Such extremes of institutional
negligence are unprecedented in human history. Inducing scarcity of an unique and essential food
resource is primarily complicit in the agonizing illnesses and deaths of billions of people.

Ancient Cannabis

Cannabis hemp has been a critical agricultural resource to the survival, spiritual evolution and
economic development of the human race for at least ten thousand years. Occupying a unique and
highly prized status in every civilisation it has been introduced to, it can be said that Cannabis
is the world's only truly global culture. It's various uses have spanned the archaelogical and
historic record, grown on every continent, inspired the three major religions, obliterated
distinctions between economic status, gender and age.

In his book "The Dragons of Eden," Carl Sagan has speculated that Cannabis may have been the first
crop cultivated by stone age man. He based this assertion upon the example of the pygmies. The
pygmies were basically hunter-gatherers until they started planting the cannabis which they used
for religious purposes. The pygmies say that they have been smoking cannabis "since the beginning
of time."

The Encyclopaedia Britannica of 1856 supports this idea calling hemp "an advancer rather than a
retarder of civilisation, "an accelerator of commerce"and a "spreader of wealth and intellect."

Cannabis is known to have provided mankind with fibre dating from 8,000 B.C. Medicinal use began
being recorded in 4000 B.C. Hemp textiles have been identified from 10,000 years ago. The oldest
human remains ever found was wearing a hemp blouse that still retained its silken texture. In 2700
B.C. Chinese written history tells us that hemp was used for fiber, oil, and as medicine. By 450
B.C. hemp was being cultivated in Persia. Introduced into Europe around 1000 A.D., by the
sixteenth century it was known to be the most widely cultivated crop in the world producing fuel,
food, herbal remedies, cloth, building materials, paper, paint, rope and sails.

In Jamestown Colony and England it was a required crop. Until the early 1900's hemp remained the
most traded agricultural commodity in the world.In short, Cannabis has been and still is, an
uniquely determinate crop, critical to mankind's survival. The fact that global warming threatens
the Earth with synergistic collapse of environment, economics and social upheaval is due in large
part to the self-serving, short-sighted choices that were made several generations ago.

Prohibition of 'marijuana' effectively induced prolonged scarcity of the most useful agricultural
resource on Earth. Because Cannabis is unique in so many ways, it is impossible to account for the
impact that intransigent political influence, inducing scarcity of a critically determinate
resource, has had on our species' evolution over the past sixty-seven years.

Free Market or Black Market?

The profound effect of inducing prolonged scarcity of the world's most useful agricultural
resource has been to obviate a free market economy, enrich the black market and effectively
undermine human health and values.

Losing confidence in Nature's ability to provide what we need has skewed social evolution into
criminalization of herbs and disrespect for the Natural Order. By devaluating and outlawing the
most useful agricultural resource on Earth, we have been led unwillingly to war against that which
we most need to sustain us.

Recognizing and actively honoring the nutritional benefit of Cannabis is the single greatest shift
in pragmatic thinking needed, for mankind to rebalance the Earth's environment, our own individual
health, and the global economy. To understand why this is true, consider the exceptional
nutritional profile of Cannabis "hemp" seed, and the long-term effects of the world's protein
supply having been suppressed for several generations.

Literally billions of people have been impacted, in almost every country, by prohibition being
imposed on world food production. Degenerative effects on health, food security and the
environment resulting from the prohibition of 'marijuana,' are as morally unconscionable as they
are economically devastating. By suppressing Cannabis production, research, and industry, a
'forbidden fruit' has been made of the world's most useful and uniquely nutritious herb.

Because a free-market in agricultural resources has not been allowed for several generations, the
world's best source of protein and EFAs has been made scarce. Inability to produce adequate
supplies of vital nutritional components has thrown off the balance of mankind's agricultural
economy and skewed our species' system of values, away from traditions of trust and respect for
Nature. Misled, away from health and agricultural abundance, man's economic evolution has evolved
into dependance on toxic, unevenly distributed, unsustainable resources.

The scarcity of Cannabis protein has created an agricultural vacuum, causing a phenomenal rise in
demand for soy protein. Increased demand for soybeans has made development of Genetically Modified
"Round-Up Ready" soy cultivars economically viable, in spite of a variety of environmental and
health concerns. These include the spread of Fusarium fungus, soil erosion, groundwater
contamination, soil compaction and mineral depletion of soils.

In addition to the cost in human suffering, the staggering toll that Cannabis eradication has had
on wildlife populations is inestimable. Mankind is far beyond its rightful jurisdiction in
legislating scarcity of an unique and essential food resource upon which other species also depend
for their survival.

Cannabis in organic agriculture

Remediation of contaminated soils with industrial hemp is one example of how this hardy crop can
be used to advantage in rotation with other crops.

"The main conclusion from our research is that hemp is a viable cropping option for organic
farming systems. It relies on minimal inputs in comparison to conventional crops especially once
crop establishment has occurred. Its weed break potential and tolerance of pests and diseases
were among the main contributions to organic systems. Additional benefits included soil
conditioning abilities, contributions to local economies and increased diversity within food and
fibre industries. Though the current market situation is impeded by legislation, the potential
for expanding the hemp market appears to be promising.

Hemp contains about 4% lignin, while trees are composed of from 18-30% lignin. To to make paper,
lignin must be chemically broken down. For this reason papercosts could be cut by 50-70%. There is
substantial environmental benefit in using hemp to produce paper in terms of source reduction of
waste, as non-Kraft, non- chlorine bleaching, paper mills can be used.

Due to the labor-intensive nature of annual sowing, harvesting, storage and transportation
hemp agriculture generates work for farmers and provides feedstock for small businesses. A higher
tensile strength, higher wet strength, longer lifespan (centuries, not decades) and greater
recyclability (seven times, compared to three) are advantages of hemp over wood pulp paper.

Hemp is an environmentally friendly source of cellulose that minimises pollution, could make
wood-chipping obsolete, and would create jobs and value-added industries.

Other agricultural and ecological benefits of farming Cannabis include suppression of weeds
without herbicides, improvement of soil structure, ease of cultivation, absence of diseases,
moderate nitrogen requirements, as a seasonal windbreak for other crops, as a field border to
distract birds from other crops, and as a source of biocides that can be used to discourage pest
infestation in other plants.

There is evidence that Cannabis is an effective "break crop" for eliminating soil infestation by
some types of nematodes. This is extremely important as currently methyl bromide, a major
atmospheric ozone-depleting chemical is used to treat fields infested by nematodes.

Hemp improves soil fertility, by drawing nutrients from deep in the soil depositing them on the
surface when it sheds its leaves. Hemp leaves and roots return 2/3 of the fertilising elements to
the soil when left in the field to decompose.

Conclusion

It is an accepted tenet of population dynamics that sustainable protein production determines
carrying capacity. Because Cannabis is an unique and essential protein resource, it is
"self-evident" that restricting access to fresh Cannabis seed has never been within the rightful
jurisdiction of any court.

An individual's right to unique and essential resources is a fundamental human right, beyond the
moral accountability of government. This is exactly the same point of law that Gandhi and his
followers made with regard to people's right to harvest salt.

Recently the U.S..government has become so arrogant in its disrespect for the fundamental human
right to farm that, in Iraq, farmers have been forbidden to save seed. This imposes GMO cultivars
on the Iraqi people, who have been left without the freedom to choose. An outrageous assault on
the integrity of the Natural Order, forcing people to consume GM foods must be recognized as
unacceptable to the point of being sociopathic.

Because herbs produce seed and drugs do not, Cannabis is truly not a "drug." It is in fact an
ancient herbal therapeutic, with a centuries-long and varied history of accepted natural value. In
a free society, people have an inalienable right to take advantage of all of its potential
benefits. That privlege comes with the obligation to future generations, to care well and
celebrate respect for what is known to be most valuable.

In the tradition of sincere, spiritually relevant appreciation for sustenance afforded by "The
Creator," or whatever entity or process produced the Natural Order upon which we all depend, every
person has an inalienable right to prosper through the use of "every herb bearing seed." (3) To
attempt control over unique and essential resources amounts to an attack on the sovereignty of
every individual.

The counter-productive effect of prohibition on organic agriculture, global food security and
production of environmentally sustainable fuels, paper, cloth and many other products has imposed
a much greater harm to humans and wildlife than any perceived threats, real or imagined, posed by
people's use of 'marijuana.' Eventually, as conditions of environment, economics and social
evolution deteriorate toward synergistic collapse, people all over the world may yet come to
realize that we are well within our Natural rights, in exercising "essential civilian demand." To
force a peaceful end to the intransigent prohibitionism that has infected our society and
mankind's economic structure, may become the only option left if governments fail to honor
"self-evident" laws that determine our ability to survive.

Paul von Hartmann
Project P.E.A.C.E.
Planet Ecology Advancing Conscious Evolution
31 January 2005

Project P.E.A.C.E. website
http://webspawner.com/users/projectpeace

Formal Individual Complaint to the U.S. Government
http://www.formalcomplaint.blogspot.com/

References:

1. " Fats That Heal, Fats That Kill". 1998. Dr. Udo Erasmus. Alive Books, Vancouver, B.C. Also
see the work of Dr. Johanna Budwig, Dr. Roberta Hamilton, Dr. William Eidelmann.

2. U.S. Declaration of Independence.

3. King James Bible. Genesis 1:29-31. Page 1.

4. "Essential Fatty Acids" by Deborah Lee, Woodland Publishing, 1997.

5. Remediation of benzo[a]pyrene and chrysene-contaminated soil with industrial hemp (Cannabis
sativa).Campbell S, Paquin D, Awaya JD, Li QX.Department of Molecular Biosciences and
Bioengineering University of Hawaii, 1955 East-West Road, Honolulu, HI 96822, USA.
1: Int J Phytoremediation. 2002;4(2):157-68.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=12655808&dopt=Abstract&itool=iconabstr

6. INTEGRATING HEMP IN ORGANIC FARMING SYSTEMS:
A Focus on the United Kingdom, France and Denmark
Barron, Coutinho, et. al., May 2003.
The Royal Agricultural and Veterinary University, Copenhagen, Denmark.
www.kursus.kvl.dk/shares/ea/ 03Projects/32gamle/_2003/integrating_hemp.pdf

7. "HEMP FARMING COULD BE SCUPPERED BY HEALTH DEPT"
A.N.C. Daily News Briefing, Cape Town, S.A.
15 September 2004.
http://www.anc.org.za/anc/newsbrief/2004/news0916.txt

8. "The Economics of Prohibition" Dr. Mark Thornton, University of Utah Press, 1992.

9. "51% Of U.S. Adults Take 2 Pills or More a Day, Survey Reports" Bowman, L. , San Diego
Union-Tribune. Jan. 17, 2001: Pg. A8.

10. "Incidence of adverse drug reactions in hospitalized patients: a meta-analysis of prospective
studies." Lazarou J; Pomeranz BH; Corey PN. 1998 Apr 15, 2005. JAMA, 279(15): Pg. 1.

11. "Ritalin nation: rapid fire culture and the transformation of human consciousness."
R DeGrandpre. (284 pages, £15.95.) W W Norton & Co. Ltd, 1999. ISBN 0-393-04685-0.

12. "Classical Biological Control of Narcotic Plants" ARS Research Project.
http://ars.usda.gov/research/projects/projects.htm?ACCN_NO=402468

13. "U.S. Congress Heads Up ARS Project: "World's Most Useful Plant" targeted for Biological
Attack"Paul J. von Hartmann. June 10, 2004.
http://www.dutch-passion.nl/news/2004/June/US-%20Congress%20Heads%20Up%20ARS%20Project%20-%20Cannabis%20targeted%20for%20Bio%20Attack.htm

14. The Dragons of Eden; Carl Sagan, Ballantine Books, NY, 1977.

15. Roman scribe Pliny, quoted in Grass Roots/Green Grass

============================================================

Sidebar 1:

1. The Holy Bible. King James Version, Page 1. Genesis 1:29-30

And God said, "Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the
earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for
meat."

"And to every beast of the earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing that creepeth
upon the earth, wherein there is life, I have given every green herb for meat."

Sidebar 2:

NUTRITIONAL ANALYSIS OF HEMP SEED
g/100g Hemp Seed (fresh, organic, non-sterilized)
Data Supplied by NewTech Laboratories

Protein 23.04
Carbohydrate e 52.67
of which sugars 2.47
Fat 9
Sodium (mg/100g) 17.7
Dietary Fibre 35.36
Kcal 384
Kjoules 1606
Saturated fatty acids 1
Mono unsaturated fatty acid 1.1
Poly unsaturated fatty acid 6.5
Trans fatty acids <0.1 href="http://">http://www.hemp.co.uk/html/polishseed.html
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Last updated 20/6/99
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The following figures have been supplied by a Polish company for Polish Seeds
Vitamins:
E 30 mg/g
C 14 mg/g
B1 9 mg/g
B2 11 mg/g
B3 25 mg/g
B6 3 mg/g
Amino Acids (mg/g of seeds):
Alanin e 9
Arginine 18.8
Cystine 19.8
Glutamin Acid 34.8
Glycin 9.7
Histidinc 2.5
Isoleucinc 1.5
Leucine 7.1
Lysine 4.3
Methionine 2
Phenylalanine 3.5
Prolamine 7.3
Serine 8.6
Treonine 3.7
Tryptophan 0.6
Tyro sine 5.8
Valine 3.9
(End of Document)

In some varieties of Cannabis four essential fatty acids are found.

The following information has been copied from

http://www.hempfood.com/I HA/iha03114.htm l

Cultivation of Cannabis oil seed varieties in Finland
J.C. Callaway1 and T.T. Laakkonen
21 Department of Pharmaceutical Chemistry,
University of Kuopio POB 1627, FIN-70211 Kuopio, Finland
2Palkkila Farm, Hatsinant ie 219, FI N-16 710 Hollola, Finland

Table 2. FIN-314 Seed Analysis Results (means of 2 analyses each of 2 random samples, standard
deviation in brackets)

Palmitic acid (C16:0)
Palmitoleic acid (C16:1)
Stearic acid (C18:0)
Oleic acid (C18:1)
Linoleic acid (C18:2)
GLA (C18:3)
Linolenic acid (C18:3)
Arachidic acid (C20:0)
Eicosenoic acid (C20:1)
Eicosadienoic acid (C20:2)
Behenic acid (C2 2:0)
Lignoceric acid (C24:0)

(End of Document)