Inside the 2026 NIHC Hemp Fiber Summit at FIT

This week on the Hemp Show, we're continuing our coverage of the National Industrial Hemp Council's Global Industrial Hemp Fiber Summit, held at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City during Fashion Week.

It was two days of farmers, breeders, processors, machine builders, designers and brands, all focused on how to get hemp from the field into something somebody will buy.

What it already is turns out to be a crop with farmers on one end, brands on the other, and a lot of empty space in between. Over two days, nearly every panel ran into that empty space from a different direction.

So on this episode, we follow the missing middle and see what we know about how much we don't know, and maybe some things we do know.

The following people appear on this episode:

Paul Benhaim, The Hemp Plastic Company

Patrick Atagi, National Industrial Hemp Council

Ryan Zaczynski, 1937 International

Zafar Riaz, Pakistan hemp project

Nayyar Kazmi, Pakistan hemp project

Ally Friedman, Bezos Earth Fund

Joe Hickey, Kentucky Hemp Growers Co-op Association