World’s Largest Cotton Producing Countries | Economic Geography

The world cotton-growing and manufacturing in­dustry has traditionally been dominated by the U.S.A. but it has been overtaken in cotton textile production by both the U.S.S.R. and China. Thus although the U.S.A. is still the largest producer of raw cotton be­cause its farming is more efficient it finds it uneco­nomic to manufacture textiles and finished clothing because imports are cheaper. The U.S.A. now pro­duces about 22 per cent of raw cotton, the U.S.S.R. 19 per cent, China 16 per cent and India 8 per cent, of the world total of about 14 million tonnes.

Although world production of cotton has con­tinually expanded the cotton market has not always been a stable one, because while there is always a demand for food crops, for instance, the demand for clothing and other textile products fluctuates with the prevailing economic climate in the various coun­tries. When times are hard, consumer goods such as clothing are among the first to suffer.

Thus demand for cotton is varied but production is much less so. Cotton is grown mostly by small farmers and there­fore production cannot be immediately geared to demand. The resultant price fluctuations often make the back-breaking work of cotton growing very un­rewarding.

On the other hand fashion plays a large role in demand for different textiles and the 1970s fashion for denim jeans popularized cotton fabrics. Cotton overproduction is not a serious problem, because the growing world population creates a continually grow­ing demand for textiles of all sorts and particularly for cotton.

In the past much cotton was manufactured in countries which produced no cotton themselves, such as Britain, France, Germany and later in Japan and Hong Kong, but today the cotton textiles industry is dominated by the major cotton-growers such as the U.S.A., the U.S.S.R., China, India and Pakistan.

The leading cotton and cotton textile producers are con­sidered in detail below, and in view of their historic importance in the textiles industry and their impor­tance today as markets for cotton fibres, some of the purely manufacturing countries are also dealt with briefly.

Cotton Production in U.S.A.:

Cotton production in the U.S.A. in the early 1950s was well over 3 million tonnes annually, but then output dropped so that by 1975 it was down to less than 2 million tonnes. This situation partly re­flects the steady decline in the land under cotton from the peak of 18 million hectares (46 million acres) in 1925 to nearly 10 million hectares (25 million acres) in 1950 and to only about 3 million hectares (7.5 mil­lion acres) in 1967.

Yields were improved during the 1950s so that production was maintained but that improvement levelled off during the 1960s and 1970s. Re­newed interest in the crop is due to widespread mech­anization allowing farmers to dispense with a large labour force, westward spread of the crop on to larger farms and a growing export sale.

The United States has a long history of cotton growing reaching back to the colonial era. The inven­tion in 1793 of a cotton gin by Eh Whitney, for separating the fibres easily from the seeds, stalks and other unwanted material, allowed large-scale cotton cultivation to be introduced.

Cotton was at first grown on large plantations worked by negro slaves but after the abolition of slavery and the Civil War this system was no longer economic. The old plantations were split up between tenant farmers. These farmers often worked the land on a share-cropping basis, the land­lord providing land and sometimes seeds, while the tenant provided labour. The tenant paid for rent and seed by handing over between one-third and one half of his final crop to the landowner.

This system and the rural indebtedness it perpetuated made the South a poverty-stricken and under-privileged area right up to the Second World War. The poor farmers continually overexploited the soil in an attempt to gain a living, especially in years of low or fluctuating prices, and in years when crops were ruined by the boll-weevil. As a result the region was the worst area for soil erosion and exhaustion in the whole of the U.S.A.

Several important changes have altered the entire economy of the old Cotton Belt. The most impor­tant has been the westward shift in cotton growing. On the flat Prairie lands large mechanized farms are more economic than the small farms of the older east­ern-regions.

In place of the cotton monoculture of the past, the old regions are being rehabilitated by afforestation and by the introduction of mixed farm­ing. The change began in the period between the wars when development of industry in the South helped to provide alternative employment.

After the War the rural South rapidly lost population to the towns and the industrial northern states, so that fewer people were dependent on the land and farming could be ra­tionalized. As a result of all these changes the special­ized growing of cotton is much more restricted in area than formerly, but where it is grown, farming is much more efficient.

(a) Soils:

Soil erosion due to the over-exploitation of farms in the old cotton belt makes cotton growing difficult. Cotton requires very fertile soils and is therefore better grown on the, as yet, less-used soils of the west. There are several areas with particu­larly fertile soils which are favourable cotton regions.

These include the Mississippi flood plain with its rich alluvial soils; the Black Waxy Prairies of Texas and the Red Prairies of Oklahoma; and the western Gulf coast. Outside the cotton belt, California has also be­come an important producer.

(b) Climate:

It has been increasingly found that cotton yields and fibre quality are both improved if the cotton is grown in drier areas, with the aid of irri­gation where necessary. The western regions have a hotter, drier climate and are therefore able to give good yields.

(c) Pests:

The drier climate also inhibits the spread of the boll-weevil which can destroy the cotton crop.

(d) Labour:

The Prairies and California are more suited than the traditional cotton-growing areas to the use of machinery.

Some cotton is still grown on the Atlantic coastal plain and in the Tennessee Valley but in these regions farming practices have been much improved in recent years.

Improvements and changes in cotton growing in the U.S.A. have led to the country becoming a lead­ing exporter of cotton fibre. Two-fifths of the crop are exported.

Despite its enormous home production of raw cotton, the U.S.A. is no longer the leading producer of cotton textiles. In 1967 U.S.A. still accounted for almost one-fifth of world cotton yarn production but this share has dropped to only 12 per cent as a result of internal competition from synthetics and cheap imports of cloth from Asia.

The northern parts of the country, particularly the New England states, have a long history of textile production, the first cotton mill being built in Pawtucket in 1790. New England had many advantages, such as the original water power supplies, easy access to coal from the Appalachians and a steady stream of skilled labour from Europe.

Cotton was easily brought by sea from the South. This situation persisted until around the end of the nineteenth century, when the advantages of New England began to be overshadowed by the far greater advantages of the Southern states. The industry was not drawn to the South by the pres­ence of raw materials, for cotton is so light that transport costs form only a very small proportion of manufacturing costs.

The great advantage of the South was the large supply of relatively cheap labour. Poor returns from the exhausted cotton lands made work in the new textile mills attractive to Southerners despite low wages. Improvements in machine design and mill operation meant that the high degree of skill formerly required was no longer essential.

Workers could be easily and quickly trained. The movement away from the South after the War and the general rise in wage rates was not a disadvantage as by this time greater automation and larger-scale operations had led to greater capital-intensity in the industry and less reliance on labour-intensive techniques. Other ad­vantages of the South included power supplies.

At first coal was used and this was available from the Appalachians, but later the enormous potential of hydro-electric power began to be developed at the Fall Line and along major rivers such as the Tennessee. Electricity is now most commonly used to power the mills. The South had the advantage of somewhat better communications with the rest of the country than New England which is cut off from the West by mountains.

There was more room for expansion, and new mills in the South could employ the latest ma­chinery, while the older areas in New England were cramped and the mills contained much old and obso­lete equipment. Thus there was a general shift of the textile industry to the South and today 95 per cent of the American cotton textile industry is located in the South.

When synthetic fibres began to be important, the South had yet another advantage in that it possessed many pulp mills where cellulose could be produced. Thus synthetic textiles and mixed cotton and synthe­tic goods are mostly made in the South. Only the woollen textile industry which requires more skill, less labour and is organized in smaller mills has re­mained in New England.

The only cotton textile in­dustry in New England today is concerned with the production of high-quality and specialized fabrics and this location has the advantage of being near New York, the major U.S. fashion centre. The large Southern mills produce a wide range of fabrics not only for the enormous home market within the U.S.A. but also for export to many parts of the world.

Des­pite its important textile industry, the United States still imports cotton, cloth and garments to supple­ment home supplies. Most imports come from Asian countries such as Japan and South Korea which can produce the goods more cheaply.

Cotton Production in U.S.S.R.:

About one-fifth of the world’s cotton lint is produced in the U.S.S.R. and about 90 per cent of this comes from Central Asia. The leading region is Uzbekistan, which produces about 66 per cent of total Soviet production. Only 10 per cent of the U.S.S.R.’s cotton is grown west of the Caspian Sea in Azerbaijan and Armenia.

The large state and collective farms are highly-mechanized and almost all of the cotton is grown in irrigated fields. The factor which affects pro­duction most is humidity. The hottest areas in Central Asia, where the relative humidity is very low, have the highest cotton yields. Wetter regions to the west have a much lower output per unit area. The U.S.S.R. produces both medium and long staple cottons.

In spite of a growing interest in synthetic fibres, cotton is still by far the most important fibre in the U.S.S.R.’s textile industry, and demand for the fibre has risen steadily during the twentieth century. Cot­ton imports to the Soviet Union have been gradually reduced and as production increases the U.S.S.R. may become a major exporter, supplying the East European countries.

Extra production is more likely to come from seed improvements and better farm and irrigation management than from great increases in the area under the crop. Areas under cotton have remained around million hectares (6.25 million acres) since the 1950s.

The cotton textile industry in the U.S.S.R. is con­centrated around Moscow in traditional industrial districts and has not been established in the cotton- growing regions to any great extent. Other cotton textile centres include Leningrad and the Baltic states, e.g. Estonia, Latvia; Ukraine; Armenia and Azerbaijan, and western Siberia. The U.S.S.R. is now the world’s largest cotton textile producer accounting for 16 per cent of the total.

Cotton Production in China:

China has pro­duced cotton textiles for about 5,000 years but its rise as a major producer of both raw cotton and cotton textiles has been of fairly recent date. It is now the third largest producer of cotton fibre and its output of textiles is exceeded only by that of the U.S.S.R. Moreover as synthetics become more and more im­portant in the West, China is likely, with Russia, to lead the world in the use of cotton in future.

The most important cotton-growing areas in China are the Great Plain of northern China, along the Huang He (Hwang Ho) and Wei He valleys; Sichuan (Szechwan); and the Chang Jiang (Yangtze) valley. Textiles are pro­duced in most of the industrial towns in all parts of the country. China, with its enormous population, has a vast domestic market for cheap cotton goods, and its low production costs based on its large labour supplies, enable it to sell textiles abroad, especially in South-East Asia where there is a large, relatively poor population.

Shanghai is the traditional cotton textile centre but other important textile towns lie within the cotton-glowing regions, e.g. Chongqing (Chung­king), Nanjing (Nanking), Xi’an (Sian), Zhengzhou (Chengchow) and Beijing (Peking).

Cotton Production in India and Pakistan:

Both India and Pakistan are important cotton fibre and cotton textile pro­ducers. The chief cotton-growing areas in India are in the north-western Deccan on the fertile black regur cotton soils derived from basaltic lava; the central and southern Deccan of Mysore and Tamil Nadu (Madras) states; and in the Upper Ganges valley (extending into Pakistan), where much of the cotton is grown with irrigation.

In Pakistan, the valleys of the Indus and its tributaries in Punjab and Sind are the main cotton- growing areas and production is dependent on irriga­tion. Much of the cotton grown in both India and Pakistan is of medium and short staple types.

Cotton textile mills were first established in India in the mid-nineteenth century, though hand-spinning and weaving of cotton had been practised for hun­dreds of years. The first area to develop textile indus­tries was Bombay, which has ready access to the Deccan cotton fields and obtained coal and textile machinery from Britain. Coal-power has been re­placed by H.E.P. generated in the Western Ghats.

The cotton textile industry soon spread to other Indian towns and is now the largest manufacturing indus­try in the country. Apart from Bombay, the major textile-producing towns are Ahmedabad, Nagpur, Sholapur, Madras, Kanpur, Delhi and Calcutta.

About one-third of India’s textile output is produced by hand- spinning and -weaving processes carried out ah over the country in rural areas. The original market for Indian textiles was its own immense population.

Im­ported textiles were expensive so that there was a great demand for cheaply-produced local goods. India has now become one of the most important textile producers in the world (ranking fourth) and has a large export market.

More emphasis has been put on ex­ports in recent years, and in Bombay and Ahmedabad much of the production is of higher quality goods destined for overseas, while the inland mills continue to make mostly cheap, poorer quality goods for the domestic market.

Pakistan’s textile industry is of more recent date, since Partition in 1948 cut off cotton growers in the Punjab from Indian textile mills. The wealth of local­ly produced cotton and the large domestic market en­couraged the rapid growth of cotton textile output and Pakistan is now self-sufficient, with some export surplus.

Cotton Production in Latin America:

Brazil has long been a major producer of raw cotton, which is grown both in the north-east and south-east of the country. Plantations have also been established in the Chaco. It is not how­ever a major cotton textile producer.

Mexico is another major cotton grower and other Caribbean and Latin American producers include Colombia, Nicara­gua; other Central American states; the West Indies, where some Sea Island cotton is grown; and Peru, where the growing of cotton has a long tradition, for cotton textiles were used by the Incas. Most of Peru’s cotton is grown in the oasis settlements in the Atacama Desert with the use of irrigation and is of very high quality long staple varieties. Overall production is, however, small.

Cotton Production in Egypt and Sudan:

Egypt accounts for about 3 per cent of the world’s raw cotton production, but its importance in world trade is greater than this figure would suggest. This is because its production from the irrigated fields of the Nile Valley is of high quali­ty. Egypt is the world’s major producer of long staple cotton, which is needed for the production of high- quality textiles and cotton thread for sewing.

The need for long staple cottons in world trade has hin­dered to some extent the development of an indige­nous textile industry because the export trade was so bouyant. Also the long staple cotton made high-quality fabrics which were too expensive for the local market. Nowadays, an increasing proportion of Egyptian medium and medium long staple cotton is used local­ly. The export income from the long staple cottons is still of importance to the Egyptian economy.

Although the output of the Sudan is relatively small the success of the Gezira Scheme, based on irri­gation from the Blue and White Niles, makes it an in­teresting example of how cotton can be successfully grown by peasant cultivators.

Regular rotation of crops and the use of fallow periods maintain soil fer­tility and thorough control of seeds and fertilizers by the Gezira Board means that yields are high. In Egypt on the other hand cotton growing is less well-organized and competes for land with much needed food crops.