Beyond the Baja – Episode Title: The Collapse in the Stalks
Imagine it’s 2022. You’re a farmer in South Dakota. You’ve just signed a contract to grow industrial hemp fiber — not for CBD, not for cannabinoids, but for infrastructure. You’re told this crop will anchor climate-smart textiles, regenerative construction, and U.S. supply chains. You’re not chasing a boom — you’re building a future.
But by 2024, the floor drops out. The price for your retted hemp stalks plummets to eighteen cents a pound — if you’re lucky enough to find a buyer. Contracts evaporate. Payments stall. And the same industry that welcomed you in with press releases and projections now treats you like overhead.
What happened?
In this episode, we trace the collapse in farmgate hemp fiber prices from 2022–2024 — not just as a market fluctuation, but as a textbook case of what happens when agricultural vision outpaces infrastructure. This isn’t a glitch. It’s a pattern. One that farmers in dairy, cotton, palm oil, corn, and soy have endured for decades.
Through historical parallels — from Soviet grain revolts to the Greek yogurt bubble — we unpack how commodity agriculture punishes its pioneers, and why hemp was never going to be immune. We look at the myths that clouded early optimism, the systems that failed to show up in time, and the structural changes required to keep this crop alive: contracts, co-ops, regional offtake, price supports, and risk-sharing infrastructure.
This isn’t the end of the hemp story. It’s the end of the illusion that purpose and legislation alone are enough.
If you’re a grower, processor, investor, or policymaker — this episode is your map. Not just to what went wrong, but to what must be built next.
Because collapse isn’t failure. It’s feedback.
