Hemp Usage in Textile Industry

Abstract

Though, hemp served to humans as a fiber plant for thousands of years, its importance faded away due to miscellaneous reasons in the beginning of twentieth century. Since the last few decades, hemp plant has been revisited for a fiber source, but not without a reason, as a result of the sustainable raw material seeking. Global concerns such as shortening resources, pollution and global warming push the textile industry to choose environmentally friendly production methods, like all other industry branches. At this point, hemp fiber has shined out with its serious sustainable production potential. This chapter mainly focuses on hemp fiber usage and production methods in textile engineering rather than the sustainable features of hemp fiber. In this context, first, the information regarding hemp plant agriculture for fiber production, fiber extraction from hemp plant and fiber properties were given. Moreover, yarn spinning from hemp fiber was explained, and hemp fabric weaving, knitting and nonwoven production were analyzed. Chemical wet processing (textile finishing processes) such as pre-treatments (such as bleaching etc.), dyeing, and finishing of hemp fibers were also reviewed. Finally, end-use applications and application areas of hemp fibers in textiles, the situation of hemp in the textile industry and the economic contribution of the hemp fiber production were given. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.