“A dry year will scare you to death, but a wet year will kill you.”

My papa’s words, often repeated by my dad, sum up the precarious balance farmers must strike between praying for rain and hoping you don’t get too much. Growing up in Robeson County, North Carolina — an area at the heart of the swampy homelands of the Lumbee Tribe — I saw how the weather could swing year-to-year between drought conditions and floods, with dry spells prompting pastors to call for rain from the pulpit and wet years keeping farmers sidelined out of their fields.

My people have lived here since time immemorial, relying on deep ancestral knowledge to cultivate the land, but the 2024 growing season was a bundle of extremes hardly seen before. 

The summer began with only 1 inch of rain in June, the second driest June on record since 1895. Farmers watched their crops struggle at a critical point in the growing season, with some counties going weeks without a single drop of rain.

Then, in July, nearly 8 inches of water fell, making it the 11th wettest July in 130 years. This was a relief for farmers, but the rollercoaster ride wasn’t over yet. August brought nearly 10 inches of precipitation from Tropical Storm Debby, wreaking havoc on crops still in the field through flooding and severe winds. While North Carolina’s staple commodity crops like corn, soybeans, cotton, and tobacco struggled, one crop thrived through it all: hemp.

The resiliency and adaptability of hemp

Hemp isn’t common in Robeson County; in fact, my first real exposure to the plant came by chance last summer, when my dad, Eddie Moore, a farmer with 35 years of experience, participated in a hemp research trial. He planted a few acres in a back field near the cow pasture as a test, and was pleasantly surprised with how resilient the plant was through a less than ideal season.

Speaking to the challenges of the flash drought, Moore said, “The seed is pretty tough. During the dry spell, some seeds didn’t have enough soil moisture to germinate when planted, but they laid there patiently and came up later. I saw that the plant was really stressed with the drought, but it suffered right through until the rains came.”

And when the rain kept coming, he saw the plant soldier through again. “Then it got really wet, and the hemp didn’t like that. But, it wasn’t a total disaster because the stem — the part used for fiber — was already made and we were still able to harvest it,” he said.

Hemp’s resiliency last summer stands in stark contrast to the wilted corn and parched soybeans on nearby plots. As climate change shifts seasonal weather patterns to the extremes in our homeland, Lumbee farmers like my dad are on the hunt for alternative crops to keep the farm above water. Could growing hemp be a viable way forward?

Hemp is a fast-growing broadleaf plant often styled as a sustainability success story: It requires minimal inputs of fertilizer, pesticides and water to reach impressive yields; improving soil health and sequestering carbon; and restoring degraded ecosystems through phytoremediation (a process where plants absorb soil contaminants).

And, as my dad saw firsthand, hemp is shown to be very adaptable to the type of extreme weather North Carolinians expect to face from climate change. While it’s easy to hear all that and get excited, experts say caution is warranted before casting hemp as a one-size-fits-all solution.

One solution of many

That’s how David Suchoff, Ph.D., assistant professor of alternative crops at NC State and lead researcher for my dad’s field trial, started our conversation in October: “I always tell folks to be very careful about selling hemp as a wonder crop. There’s no silver bullet to save us from climate change. It takes a system of solutions, of which hemp is a nice component.” 

In my dad’s case, he grew a particular variety of hemp whose fibers are useful for textiles. The focus on fiber was a strategic decision by Suchoff, who knew farmers were wary of the boom and bust cycles associated with CBD hemp in previous years, and wanted to make sure that the next iteration of industrial hemp in NC had a more stable market.

To do that, Suchoff built a research collaboration across the textile supply chain, connecting farmers to processors and textile engineers to end customers. Why textiles? “Just like agriculture, the textile industry is focusing on sustainability. Textiles is a dirty industry from a number of aspects, from waste and water use to synthetics and microplastics. Hemp fiber gives manufacturers a way to make the whole process more sustainable,” Suchoff said. 

A more sustainable future is what motivated Andre West, Ph.D., associate professor and director of Zies Textiles Extension at NC State, to focus on hemp fiber, too. My dad and I visited the NC State College of Textiles in January where we toured a newly installed hemp fiber processing system meant to be a model for North Carolina businesses interested in working with hemp blends.

West showed us around the production floor as he discussed ongoing work with the Department of Defense to design hemp uniforms for the U.S. military. He describes himself as a fashion designer at heart, but he has shifted his attention to raw material sourcing in the last decade. When asked why, West spoke with no hesitation: “This (being more sustainable to address climate change) is the most important thing in the world right now.” 

Overcoming obstacles

If hemp is sustainable to grow and sustainable to use, then why isn’t it more widespread in the U.S.? Pre-contact Indigenous peoples throughout Turtle Island used native species of fiber hemp to create all manner of textiles, including ropes, nets, and clothing.

When Europeans first arrived, they brought new strains of hemp with them and continued to use it for myriad purposes. But over time, a combination of factors — including the rise of cotton as a dominant cash crop, the proliferation of petroleum-based synthetic fibers, and the cultural stigmatization of psychoactive cannabis — led to a sharp decline in domestic hemp cultivation.

Even though cotton is no longer as dominant and consumers are eager to shift away from synthetics, hemp production continues to be stymied by legacy government regulations that treat hemp much more strictly than other crops.

All three interviewees mentioned deregulation as a critical next step for greater hemp adoption. Suchoff described the process in this way: “Right now, under USDA policy, hemp is hemp. It doesn’t matter if it’s CBD or grain or fiber. It’s all handled the same and a farmer has to get an FBI check to secure a license to grow it. Then they have to get the crop tested for THC to make sure it’s under the legal limit, and that’s a lot of money.” 

The cost of regulation, high-quality seeds, and specialized equipment adds up quickly, creating a barrier to entry for farmers working with limited resources. The need for farmers to make a big initial investment for production is matched by high uncertainty among buyers in the market as they assess how willing consumers are to choose textiles made from hemp.

What’s next for hemp-growers in North Carolina?

Fiber hemp thrived in the drought-turned-deluge weather of North Carolina last summer, but according to my dad, farmers need to know more than that before they start planting more acres. “What I’m interested in is finding out what the profit potential is. Because ultimately, that’s what it’s all about. Can we make money with this? Can we survive growing it?” 

My dad’s question brings me back to my papa’s words. As Lumbee people and a farming community, so much of our history is about figuring out how to survive as the world changes around us.

I can’t say for sure whether hemp will be a large part of our story, but I do know our people will find a way to survive. As my dad said, the success of hemp fiber depends not only on resilience in the field but also on its ability to offer a viable economic future for farmers.