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Since graduating from high school in Abilene in 2001, Aaron Owens has spent the better part of two decades cowboying in West Texas. He went from training horses as a ranch hand to helming his own cattle operation specializing in Corriente, a small breed of bull used in rodeo roping events. Then, in 2017, Owens decided to invest in Texas’ burgeoning hemp industry. Within a few years, he’d sold all his cattle, moved to Dripping Springs, and formed a new business, Tejas Tonic.
Although Texas wouldn’t legalize industrial hemp broadly until two years later, the entrepreneur had been in touch with friends working in the cannabis industry in Colorado and could smell the opportunity that would soon be budding in his home state. In 2019, House Bill 1325 authorized the production and retail sale of industrial hemp products, so long as they contain less than 0.3% tetrahydrocannabinol (THC).
“We grew our first crop in Dripping Springs in 2020, and it was an epic success,” says Owens, who is also a founding board member of the Texas Hemp Coalition. “We had a massive party with people driving from Dallas, Houston, and San Antonio to help us put plants in the ground for the first time—it was a cultural milestone.”
Photograph courtesy Tejas Tonic.
Today, he runs one of the largest organic hemp farms in the Lone Star State, located just outside of Austin, where he grows and processes cannabis to manufacture both beverages and gummies. It’s a perfectly legal business, and it’s just one small part of an industry that generated $4.3 billion in revenue last year with an estimated total economic impact over $10 billion. But all of that could be in jeopardy if some state lawmakers get their way.
An ardent faction of Texas Republicans—spearheaded by Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick and Sen. Charles Perry—have moved for an all-out ban of THC products in the current legislative session with Senate Bill 3. That proposed law, which would still allow products with other chemical compounds found in hemp such as CBD and CBG, has already passed the Senate and is currently being considered by the House. Ultimately, that bill would have to receive approval from both chambers of the legislature to become law. Patrick has threatened to force a special session if heavy restrictions aren’t passed before the current period ends in early June.
Hemp industry workers like Owens and some legislators have concerns about the broad nature of the Senate bill. “My hope is that we can have a more reasonable conversation than what we’re hearing in the Senate right now,” Democratic Rep. James Talarico says. “I would imagine most Texans would not be in favor of a total ban.”
Talarico is right: A recent poll from the University of Houston found that 62% of Texans (including 71% of Democrats and 53% of Republicans) support legalizing marijuana for recreational purposes by people 21 and older. “Dan Patrick is certainly in a tiny minority here in the state who want to see it banned,” Talarico says.
The Democratic legislator from Round Rock isn’t alone in his thinking. His Republican colleague Ken King filed House Bill 28, which serves as a response to the more restrictive Senate bill but would still drastically curtail the growing industry. HB28 calls for the complete ban of all edibles, smokables, and synthetic cannabinoids along with the new guidelines for rigorous testing of the chemical potency of products.
Reading between the lines of the bill, it becomes clear that only one viable type of cannabis product remains: beverages. Notably, the bill also moves oversight of hemp production from the Departments of Agriculture and State Health Services to the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission (TABC).
“Big liquor is interested,” Owens says, adding that alcohol lobbyists in the state have enormous power to sway policy. “As a hemp industry, we’ve got to work together, and we’ve got to learn how to dance with big liquor.”
In addition to outlawing most hemp consumables, the bill specifies that products cannot contain any cannabinoids other than THC, CBD, and CBG. Isolating those few chemical compounds from more than a hundred others contained within hemp raises another huge problem for growers and processors: “That introduces a new step that is going to be very complicated and cost a lot of money,” Owens says.
Photography courtesy Tejas Tonic.
If enacted, the restrictions on chemical compounds could gut the industry, putting many of the existing businesses—an estimated 8,500—out of commission. It would likely mean that alcohol corporations with more robust infrastructure and deeper pockets would be handed control of the hemp industry.
And that’s not the only concern about limiting the ingredients present in hemp. “It takes all 130 compounds working together to make it the most effective,” Owens says. Proponents of that thinking say using the “whole flower” or “full spectrum” provides an “entourage effect” that offers a variety of benefits—and there’s some scientific evidence to support the concept.
A double-blind study published by Johns Hopkins University last year showed that D-limonene (a chemical compound found in hemp) reduces anxiety sometimes caused by THC alone. These sorts of findings have led Owens and many others to claim that lawmakers are making a knee-jerk reaction when more understanding is needed.
Back when he was ranching, Owens prided himself on being able to breed the best cattle at any rodeo. “I’ve always nerded out on genetics,” he says. “I got cattle that were the roughest and the toughest, the best horns, they ran the hardest.” He has always taken that same approach with processing hemp. He was fully convinced of the “entourage effect” long before it was studied in a lab—proof that there’s plenty of wisdom to be gleaned out there on Texas ranches.
The House State Affairs committee heard public testimony on the bill last week, and there’s still time for HB 28 to see amendments. For example, it’s possible that the text of law could be altered to allow gummies or to include more of the chemical compounds found in “whole flower” hemp while still restricting synthetics. Regardless, it appears that the hemp industry will certainly face increased regulation and restriction soon. Exactly what that will look like remains to be seen.
The situation unfolding in the legislature right now essentially features three major players: lawmakers out for a political victory, an alcohol industry interested in cashing in on a new product, and a collective of upstart farmers and entrepreneurs who’ve spent the last half decade pioneering hemp in the state of Texas. “We’re not going to stop, because that’s who we are,” Owens says. “We like to help people with cannabis.” To put it bluntly, those in the hemp industry face an uphill battle in the Lone Star State, but their hopes remain high.
“}]] The Texas Legislature is considering two bills that would drastically curtail the state’s burgeoning hemp industry, which brings in millions in tax revenue. Read More
