Farming hemp could help to overcome the devastating effect years of pesticide spraying has brought to Florida’s declining citrus industry, according to a Tarpon Springs-based company that is developing a strategy based on processing of the plant’s stalks.
Growing hemp to pull toxins from the soil could give orange, grapefruit and specialty citrus groves a chance to fight back against Citrus Greening Disease (also called Huang Long Bin (HLB)), a key contributor to the industry’s decline in Florida, according to hemp veteran Robert Clayton, CEO and CTO at Fi Bear, a supply chain developer that is exploring a range of basic fiber applications.
“HLB is what you get when your trees are too sick to fight the Citrus Psyllid (insect) that injects the bacterium,” Clayton said of the disease. “I think it is the end result of 50 years of spraying trees four times a year. Chemicals kill the biome and hemp shows it dramatically.”
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