WAFBA Announces a Pause for 2023 Southern Hemp Expo in Nashville
SHE became dominated by Delta-8 and other intoxicating hemp-derived cannabinoids popular in areas where adult-use cannabis is not legal.
LOVELAND, Colo. (April 18, 2023) -- WAFBA -- We Are For Better Alternatives, the umbrella organization that hosts and produces NoCo Hemp Expo, Southern Hemp Expo, Hawaii Hemp Conference, Winter Hemp Summit and other hemp-centric conferences, trade shows and events -- is going to pause the 2023 Southern Hemp Expo. The Southern Hemp Expo, aka SHE, launched in 2018 in Nashville as the sister show to NoCo Hemp Expo, the most comprehensive hemp exposition and trade show on the planet.
SHE was a highly successful event in both 2018 and 2019 but was canceled in 2020 due to the Covid pandemic. SHE moved to Raleigh, North Carolina, in 2021 and back to Nashville in 2022. Both shows struggled to regain the momentum that the hemp industry had prior to the pandemic and both shows ended up being dominated by the rise in the intoxicating hemp-derived cannabinoid category, including Delta-8, HHC and other derivatives that have come to be popular with the consumer market in areas of the United States where adult-use cannabis is not yet legal.
Hemp for Health and Wellness
Both NoCo Hemp Expo and Southern Hemp Expo were founded on the decades-long mission and mantra that hemp is for health and wellness for humans and animals and an environmental benefactor for the planet in being able to produce eco-friendly, carbon-neutral to carbon-negative materials for a variety of industrial applications. These include commercial and residential construction products, textiles, automotive components, paper and packaging, bioplastics and biocomposites, animal bedding, biochar and more.
Another long-standing mantra for the hemp industry has been “hemp does not get you high,” which was the case until the domestic oversupply of CBD biomass increased significantly in 2019 and 2020. Additionally, the FDA continued to skirt its regulatory responsibilities given to the agency by Congress in the 2018 Farm Bill to regulate the burgeoning and popular CBD market. The lack of regulatory oversight kept major retailers and major consumer brands on the sidelines as well as investment money out of the industry. This in turn was a factor in the increased oversupply and the eventual development of the synthesized, hemp-derived cannabinoid market that is proliferating today. This market has opened up a variety of concerns, from consumer safety issues to state product bans as well as state legislation approving of these products, and other various regulatory murkiness around the country. To put it simply, it's a mess and extremely complicated to navigate in this new category of the hemp industry. To be clear, WAFBA, Southern Hemp Expo and its management are not in favor of "banning" or making "illegal" this new category of hemp-derived products. This category of products needs federal regulation, which we hope will occur in the upcoming 2023 Farm Bill.
Focus on Flagship Event
With the above-mentioned confusion, complexity and the state of intoxicating hemp-derived cannabinoids, WAFBA has made the decision to focus its trade show and event energy on its flagship event, NoCo Hemp Expo, and to do everything we can to build this event as the international hub and gathering spot of hemp-based heath, wellness, nutrition, environmental, and socially impactful opportunities that can benefit humanity and the planet.
For additional information and to keep abreast of future activities and events, we encourage the industry and interested parties to subscribe to our newsletter and visit our media platform at www.letstalkhemp.com.
Contact
Morris Beegle, WAFBA, info@nocohempexpo.com
Steven Hoffman, Compass Natural, steve@compassnaturalmarketing.com, tel 303.807.1042