On Queensland's Granite Belt, 200 kilometres south-west of Brisbane, sheep graze on the hard and rocky soils but the region could soon also be home to a boom new agriculture industry: cannabis.
Cannabis sativa, also known as hemp, is an emerging crop projected to bring Australian farmers $10 million a year by 2026 and trials in the Granite Belt have yielded success.
It contains less than 0.3 per cent tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), so it is not for those who seek the "high" traditionally associated with marijuana.
Stanthorpe grazier and Australian country music star James Blundell says he is pleasantly surprised by the results of a trial crop on his property.
"With the exception of a couple of more covert attempts to grow the plant back in my early 20s, this will be my first time growing [industrial hemp]," he said.
"We put an old plough into a paddock that had never been cultivated and I had no idea how the plant would respond.
"I knew it to be a resilient plant but I didn't realise how hardy it really was."
Mr Blundell's trial crop was overseen by statutory government body AgriFutures Australia and the University of Sydney to test the viability of nine different industrial hemp varieties under different climatic conditions.
Associate Professor Guy Roth led the project, which had trial sites at Stanthorpe and Narrabri, northwest NSW.
"We cultivated the trials in a very similar way to most crops and used conventional cropping machinery and conventional practices, which makes it attractive to farmers," he said.
A place alongside cotton?
Both Mr Roth and agronomist John Muir, who managed the Stanthorpe trial, believe growing hemp along with traditional crops is key to the success of the burgeoning industry.
"At the moment, we generally recommend hemp to be irrigated," Mr Muir said.
"If you are growing summer crops now, like cotton, then you can grow hemp."
AgriFutures Australia estimates that industrial hemp will require two-to-six megalitres of water per hectare, lower than cotton's average irrigation requirement of between six and seven megalitres.
A booming industry
Australia's production of hemp has grown from 100 hectares in 2013-14 to 2,300 hectares in 2020-21.
Hemp Farms Australia CEO Lauchlan Grout says that, despite this rapid growth, hemp still is not considered a commercial crop, but he believes this is changing.
"The reason is the end market probably hasn't had enough time to grow or scale into something that could allow farmers or processors to be profitable," Mr Grout said.
"Per tonne of clean and dried seed for a food or a nutritional cosmeceutical market, hemp now goes for anywhere between $2.60 to $3 per kilogram," he said.
"So there is a lot of value in the product and the end market can afford it.
"The processing just requires quite a lot of up-front capital but the big guys are doing that now."
Faith in the industry's growth
Blundell has high hopes for his farm's future in hemp.
"I'm absolutely altruistic about the value of the plant," he said.
"I know how good it is and I'm ruthless, ruthlessly commercial about it."
He said by 2025 his hemp could be used as building material, animal feed, clothing fibre or a consumable health product.
"I would regard that as a remarkable achievement," he said.
Research needs to keep pace
On a hemp plot just out Narrabri, NSW Department of Primary Industries plant pathologist Karen Kirkby says research needs to keep up with the farmers' enthusiasm.
"It's not a new industry," she said.
"It's actually quite old but as far as the technology and knowledge applied to it in Australia, it's still emerging.
"So I'd like to increase that knowledge."
Ms Kirkby supports the creation of a hemp cooperative research centre to achieve this: "Then we can align these new projects for a long term [research] outcome."
