India should make efforts to be a price influencer in the international cotton market, said Lalit Kumar Gupta, Chairman and Managing Director of Cotton Corporation of India (CCI), in Coimbatore on Friday.
Inaugurating the bi annual cotton conference organised by the Indian Cotton Federation jointly with the Indian Cotton Association, he said all stakeholders of the Indian cotton sector should focus on productivity, quality, transparency, differentiation, and price discovery.
India has the scale as it is one of the top five cotton producers. But, its production does not meet the consumption needs. “Our objective should be clear – to be a globally competitive producer.” For this productivity is important. Under the Mission on Cotton, about five lakh hectares are targeted in the first year to increase productivity. In a high density planting tried on 25,000 ha, the yield achieved is 15 quintal of seed cotton per acre.
In terms of quality, the global market needs fibre quality that is consistent and contamination free. To reduce contamination, the entire industry should work together.
Another critical factor is price discovery. There should be transparency and standards. “We have fragmented data. We need actual data and this information should be integrated with the entire system,” he added.
The CCI procured 105 lakh bales of cotton from the market this cotton season and has sold 94 lakh bales. It has about 17 lakh bales with it, he said.
K.V. Srinivasan, former International Textile Manufacturers’ Federation president, said the Indian textile industry got a boost in the 1990s because of higher cotton yield in the domestic market. “The time has come for a technology boost to improve cotton yield again to compete with Brazil, the US and China (in cotton production),” he said.
Of the total cotton produced globally, 74 % comes from four countries, including India that has 38 % of the world’s area under cotton in it. If the yield improves, India will be the leader in cotton production, he said.
