The Hindu Business Line : Cotton offtake may top 350 lakh bales in 2010

The textile industry's cotton requirement is growing at 6 per cent annually and its consumption by 2010 will exceed 350 lakh bales (of 170 kg), according to Mr K.N. Viswanathan, Secretary of the South India Cotton Association (SICA).

Annual output of cotton, which hovered around 150-170 lakh bales till 2003-04, breached 230 lakh bales in 2004-05 and the yield further exceeded 240 lakh bales last season, imparting stability in production. This year (2006-07 season), the crop is projected to touch even 270 lakh bales possibly making India the second largest global producer of cotton after China.

Marketing cotton

But, to market such a large volume of cotton annually is a mind-boggling exercise for the country's cotton economy, with which the livelihood of over 65 crore people right from the farm up to garment production is closely tied, Mr Viswanathan told a team of cotton farmers/ginners/traders/textile entrepreneurs and government officials from four East African countries, at a special training programme now underway at the South India Textile Research Association (SITRA) here Tuesday.

SITRA is holding the first ever two-week orientation programme on "cotton cultivation, commerce, quality aspects and value addition" for the members of the cotton community from Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Ethiopia. The training programme, intended to provide insights into India's experience in cotton cultivation, marketing, quality initiatives, productivity enhancement besides dealing with other cotton trade-related aspects, is being conducted as part of the `south-south' initiative under the aegis of the WTO/International Trade Centre (ITC).

"ITC had last year organised similar initiative for the cotton farmers/ginners/trade/industry from West African states who were offered training in China on aspects relating to the cotton marketing. This is the first time the ITC as facilitator for enhancing the cotton trade competitiveness for the African growers/ginners has brought the members of the East African cotton growers and industry to India for such a training programme," said Mr Daniel Torres, the ITC Consultant for international trade competitiveness in cotton, textiles and clothing market development section.

"Low productivity, high seed costs and price compression on account of heavy indebtedness of the cotton growers are among the banes faced by the cotton sector in the country. India's cotton cultivation is also witnessing positive changes such as introduction of high-yielding seeds in the form of genetically-modified crop strains," Mr Viswanathan said.

He said these measures had enabled the country to march towards self-sufficiency in cotton production.

The textile industry is faced with shortage of extra long staple (ELS) cotton to the extent of six lakh bales, which is being imported by the local industry. To bridge this gap, SICA has teamed up with Southern India Mills Association and submitted a special programme for the ELS cotton development under mission-mode.