The Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture has been inundated with applications to grow hemp this year, with the epicenter of would-be hemp farmers concentrated in neighboring Lancaster County, writes Sam Wood for the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Currently out of the more than 300 applications received, at least 80 are from the Lancaster area.

“We have a couple of people managing the permitting program,” said Shannon Powers, spokeswoman for the Department of Agriculture, “and they’re in a frenzied mode of finalizing the permits, so farmers can get their seed in the ground.”

She said that, so far, 80-plus applications have already been approved.

Farmers are now allowed to grow commercial industrial hemp crop in Pennsylvania for the first time in decades. It was legalized late last year, when the president signed the Farm Bill.

In addition to selling to CBD producers, hemp growers expect to sell their harvest for use as a building material, textiles, and a number of other uses.

Read more about hemp-farming applications in the Philadelphia Inquirer here.

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