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University Daily Kansan, October 1, 1982
Pot will be third largest crop, group says
By United Press International
WASHINGTON - Marijuana will be America's third largest crop cash this year with a value of more than $10 billion and a law reform group predicted yesterday.
George Farnham, director of the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, told a Senate subcommittee that only corn and soybeans would have a higher cash value.
Farham urged creation of "a regulated and taxed marijuana market that would entirely remove marijuana from the criminal justice system" and produce billions in new federal revenues.
Federal authorities told the panel that big-time marijuana growers were moving into remote national forests and using armed guards or explosives to protect their harvests on public property were posing a threat to public safety.
As much as half the nation's marijuana crop may be coming from federal property, Farman said.
FRANK MONASTERO, assistant operations administrator for the Drug Enforcement Administration, said, "Armed guards, booby traps and explosive devices to protect the marijuana fields have surfaced.
These actions not only deny access to hikers and campers to portions of
our common lands, but also pose a very real potential threat to the public safety as well.
Robert Burford, director of the Interior Department's Bureau of Land Management, said some pest control and fertilization techniques made marijuana endangered the environment and natural resources.
He referred specifically to use of arsenic to control rodent damage to the marijuana crop. There is danger the poison will be eaten by other animals or domestic into the ground water or domestic water supplies, Burford said.
FARNHAM SAID that the weed was being grown on federal land in at least 43 states and that the volume from the federal property ranged between 30 percent and 50 percent of the nation's total output.
monastero and Burford declined to estimate how much marijuana was being grown on public lands, but Monastero said illegal domestic production in 1980 was thought to have been between 700 and 1,000 metric tons.
Farnham, emphasizing that he represents marijuana users, not growers, said most often growers had chosen federal land, instead of private property, so authorities could not use ownership records to track them
land is "the inevitable violence associated with it," he said.
His group's chief concern over cultivation of marijuana on federal
"Most violence," Farnham said, "not related to law enforcement officials but rather against people who were violating laws." Few growers would risk violence or
gunfire against law enforcement officials during a raid."
And, he said. "A regulated market is the only effective means available to ensure that we are increasing problem of marijuana cultivation on federal and private lands."
Experts say wheat still No.3
kansas agricultural specialists yesterday disputed a claim by the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws that a $1 billion marijuana crop would replace wheat as the third largest cash crop in the country.
Only corn and soybeans will have a higher cash value, George Farnham, national director of NORML, told a Senate subcommittee yesterday.
But Galen Swenson, grain commodity coordinator for the state agricultural board, disagreed with that figure. Swenson placed the total cash value of the nation's wheat crop at $25 billion.
Corn, soybeans and wheat are usually the nation's largest cash crops. Swenson said. And each is considerably more than $10 billion, he said.
SWENSON SAID that marijuana certainly would not replace wheat as a cash crop in Kansas.
And John Dukelow, a market
specialist for the Kansas Wheat Commission, said he thought NORMAL was handling numbers that the group did not understand. Even though he didn't know the value of the crop produced would exceed $10 billion, he said.
Dukelow said wheat currently was priced at $3.50 a bushel in Kansas. About 2.8 billion bushels are produced annually in the United States and 462 million bushels are produced in Kansas, he said.
Farnham appeared before a Senate subcommittee to ask for the creation of a "regulated and taxed marijuana market," which he said would produce billions of dollars in new federal revenues.
KANSAS POT is not worth much, because it has only minute amounts of THC, the active ingredient that produces the plant's drug effect, said Ralph Brooks, research assistant of the Kansas Biological Survey and assistant director of the KU Herbarium.
New statistics indicate economic decline
Unemployment rate may increase
By United Press International
WASHINGTON—Leading economic indicators dropped 0.9 percent for August in their first decline in five months, the Commerce Department reported yesterday — raising new doubts that an end to the recession is
A separate report issued by the Labor Department on data collected only 12 days ago showed a record weekly total claims for unemployment insurance.
It was the highest figure since the department began adjusting the weekly claims for routine seasonal layoff and benefits. In 2014, the nation's unemployment rate for Sep-
member, to be announced Oct. 8, will top the 9.8 percent post-war high of July
The composite index of economic indicators is based on figures for 10 categories of economic activity most relevant to the economy through the next several weeks.
THE COMPONENT that economists think provides the best approximation of the current state of the economy, the index of coincident indicators, dropped 0.6 percent — showing that August was the month of the 13-month old recession.
But, with mid-term congressional elections less than five weeks away, the administration expressed confidence could prove only a temporary setback.
"We feel this month's dip in the leading indicators is a temporary interruption," Commerce Secretary Malcolm Baldrige told reporters at a White House news conference. "We expect them to go up again in September, which would mean an trend in five of the last six months."
Any negative factors for the September indicators report are expected to be overwhelmed by the strong increase in stock prices during the late August and September spending spree on Wall Street.
Baldridge said his earlier predictions that recovery would begin in June "may have been three or four months before that, and the difference that happened
is that interest rates have kept up
or longer than any of us suspects.
NOW, BALDRIGE SAID, interest rates have fallen, inflation has softened and "we're clearly in an interim period of recovery," the commission and the beginning of a recovery."
On Capitol Hill, House speaker Thomas O'Neill, D-Mass., said President Reagan had brought the economy "to the brink of disaster," instead of rescuing it as the administration claimed.
The 0.92 percent overall drop in the composite index for August resulted from the same pattern of conflicting analyses being containing analysts for months.
--offer good from 10 a.m.-Midnight-through October
Free Beer
Buy 2 Draws—Get One Free Draws 50°
2408 S. Iowa
EFFECTIVE LISTENING PROGRAM
Two sessions Tuesday and Thursday October 5 and 7 7:30 to 9:30 p.m.
For registration and payment of fees contact the Student Assistance Center
Bring your Parents in and enjoy our *Old ice cream favorites
Enjoy a Taste of Yesteryear
*Hot Giant Sandwiches & Home made stew
*Antique atmosphere of the 1920's
Open Mon - Thurs 8am-10pm
Fri-Sat 8am-11pm
Sun 11am-10pm
1006 Mass
749-1660
5148121344 25TH & IOWA-HOLIDAY PLAZA 5148121344
Buddy Mangine/KANSAN
John Long, facilities operations employee, gets a surprise shower while setting up sprinklers to water the grass during the current dry spell.
ECONOMICS STUDENTS:
COME TO THE ORGANIZATIONAL MEETING OF THE K.U.
ECONOMICS SOCIETY
*MEET YOUR PROFESSORS AND FELLOW SUFFERERS TO DISCUSS CLASS LEARNING *LEARN ABOUT JOB OPPORTUNITIES WITH AN ECONOMICS DEGREE OR CONCENTRATION *LEARN ABOUT DEPARTMENT PARTIES, REAL-World LECTURE SERIES, AND THE ECONOMICS STUDENT ORGANIZATION *HAVE THE OPPORTunity TO TALK WITH UP-PERCLASSMEN WITH A GREAT DEAL EXPERIENCES IN ECONOMICS DEPARTMENT. FACULTY AND ECONOMICS IN GENERAL *LEARN ABOUT SPECIAL TUTORING SESSIONS FOR LOWER LEVEL COURSES.*
THE MEETING IS MONDAY, 4 OCTOBER IN 405 SG. AT 4:00 pm
The British are Here!
SUA presents a mini-festival of the best in recent British cinema:
QUADROPHENIA—The Who's exciting "angry young man" film, Oct. 8-9.
THE CONQUEROR WORM-a scathing religious horror film, Oct. 12.
SCUM- a look at a juvenile prison in the tradition of "CLOCKWORK ORANGE." Oct. 14.
THE WICKER MAN—a horror thriller from the author of "Sleuth," Oct. 31.
And this Sunday, Derek Jarman's revolutionary Shakespeare movie—
2:00 p.m. Woodruff Aud. $1.50