By Greg Gonzales
When it comes to hemp-based foods, no company has been as close to the frontier as Manitoba Harvest. With its beginnings in the legalization of hemp in Canada, the company focuses on providing quality hemp foods and consumer education, and incorporates sustainability and forward thinking into its daily operations.
After hemp foods helped him lose weight and gain energy as a teen, CEO and Co-founder Mike Fata started Manitoba Hemp Alliance, a pro-hemp advocacy group that helped legalize hemp in Canada. Once the legislation passed in 1998, he and his partners began Manitoba Harvest Hemp Foods, helping to open the doors to an entirely new market and set the standard for the industry.
Manitoba Harvest products are all made from hemp hearts. These shelled hemp seeds have a somewhat nutty flavor, rich and creamy with a taste like sunflower seeds or pine nuts, and the versatility of the food makes it an easy addition to lax and rigorous diets, and everywhere beyond and between. Manitoba Harvest raw hemp hearts and hemp oil can be added to cereals, ice cream and salads. And the hemp heart bars make a convenient and healthy snack for kids, commuters, hikers or anyone on the go. The bars come in chocolate, vanilla and apple-cinnamon flavors to please multiple palates.
Food sourcing can get difficult when finding a seller, with a lot of questions about quality, contamination and farming practices, but Manitoba Harvest is the largest vertically integrated hemp foods producer. The company grows, manufactures and sells its own product lines, so it has control over product quality from seed to shelf and is the largest hemp seed contractor worldwide. In 2012, the company’s manufacturing facility received British Retail Consortium’s Global Standards Certification, and the products are also certified organic, GMO-free and all-natural.
The company is also a certified B Corporation, meaning Manitoba Harvest is held to higher standards of social and environmental performance, along with transparency and accountability. That includes taking good care of the team: All employees are paid 20 percent more than living wages, with bonus eligibility. On the sustainability side, 75 percent of the company’s printed materials use sustainable materials while half the energy used in corporate offices comes from renewable sources. The company also educates farmers about hemp’s potential, and encourages them to grow more hemp acres, which continues its efforts to spread the word about hemp foods.
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The buzz around hemp-based foods has been about their dense nutritional value, along with taste. A single 30-gram serving provides 10 grams of plant protein, 10 grams of omegas and only three grams of carbohydrates. Hemp hearts also provide iron and vitamin E. Their high nutrition puts them in the superfoods category, even surpassing chia and flax.
Not a lot of consumers are familiar with hemp foods beyond what they know about hemp fibers and psychoactive varieties of the cannabis plant. According to Kelly Saunderson, Manager of Corporate and Public Affairs, the best strategy is to let people try hemp foods for themselves. To prove it, Manitoba Harvest sent out 2 million samples. While attending various trade shows, Saunderson said she’s noticed a before-and-after kind of reaction to trying hemp hearts.
“You pour them in a sample cup, in their hand, and they get this look on their face,” she said. “You can kind of see the transformation on their face; they like it.”
With the company’s December acquisition of Hemp Oil Canada, Saunderson said to expect further company growth in coming years, along with new and delicious hemp food products.
To learn more about Manitoba Harvest and hemp heart products, go to manitobaharvest.com or call 1.800.655.HEMP.