o d of the clear supernatant was again determined at 280 nm table 5 in table 5 based on the value of od 280 it is evident that that the protease subtilisin was efficient at ph 8 0 8 5 9 0 and 9 5 but slightly more at 9 0 than the rest the use of alkaline ph in the present protease treatment is therefore in big contrast to the use of acidic ph of the aspergillus enzyme mixture described in various prior art treatment of hemp fiber from decorticated bast skin of young hemp 70 days with proteases in order to confirm that protease treatment is applicable to other hemp fiber sample the protocol used in example 1 was repeated for the processing of the young hemp grown for 70 days in the region of peace river alberta canada including steps 1 to 5 in step 3 involving protease treatment 2 samples were treated with or without the protease subtilisin at 0 2 u03bcl ml the od 280 of both the raw and the centrifuged supernatants was determined table 6 the od 280 of the protease supernatant were consistently higher than the control it therefore indicated that the protease treatment is effective to.