Southern Tier is part of nation’s growing hemp revival

They were not chosen, Falcone recounts, “but it did give us an opportunity to meet a lot of folks.” Among them were people from a Kentucky business called GenCanna.

Falcone was so impressed, he invested in the company and now serves on its board of directors. “In the last four years I got to see the business grow and flourish,” he says.

Falcone is applying GenCanna’s lesson to Southern Tier Hemp as the new company utilizes protocols and standards for growing and processing the crop. “Gencanna is a strategic partner,” he says.

The goal isn’t simply to grow the crop and then process it at harvest time, he explains. Southern Tier Hemp aims to stagger planting and harvesting so that the company has a “large and sustainable supply so we have CBD in the building at all times.”

Southern Tier Hemp is not alone in its interest, explains Kaelan Castetter. His company, Castetter Sustainability Group, consults with farmers and processors starting in the industry. The firm organized the Southern Tier Hemp Summit at the Koffman Southern Tier Incubator in downtown Binghamton. It drew 150 attendees, including experts, those already in the business, and local individuals looking to get their own businesses involved in the field. “It was not just hippies showing up saying, ‘I want to grow hemp!’” Castetter says.

While farmers are learning to grow hemp, processors are just now buying the equipment needed to process it. Falcone says they are starting small, having just planted the first plants in Endicott last year. “We don’t want to go out and spend money foolishly.”

Processes are similar, but not identical to handling other crops. The hemp will need to be dried, in a way similar to how tobacco is dried, Castetter says.

Extracting oil, Falcone says, will be similar to the way oils are processed from other plants, such as soybeans.

Falcone sees the industry growing rapidly in the Southern Tier and, with support from the state and local universities, being a hotbed of development. “We want this to be a center of excellence for the hemp industry.”

As for Southern Tier Hemp, “I see us in three to four years having up to 100 employees.”