2011 ANNUAL PREVIEW: Keeping Things All in the Family

At the 69th Plenary Meeting of the International Cotton Advisory Committee (ICAC) in Lubbock, Executive Director Terry Townsend began his report by pointing out the good that cotton does for global and regional economies. The fiber is grown in more than 100 countries on about 33 million hectares and is one of the most significant agricultural crops in the world. More than 100 million families are directly engaged in cotton production, and about 250 million people benefit from both cotton production and related activities.”

Dr. Townsend quickly moved on to describe the overblown and exaggerated attacks brought against cotton by its critics, and offered a three-pronged response:
1. Listening to valid concerns,
2. Improving where appropriate through best practices, and
3. Confronting egregious information campaigns and calling to account those who create and sustain those negative campaigns.

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Of course, this criticism came as no surprise to the International Forum for Cotton Promotion (IFCP). For years, we’ve been cataloging ads and communications that focus on exaggerated misinformation about cotton, delivered by those who say they want to do good things for humanity. We’ve listened to tirades about poisoning the earth, water depletion, and chemical usage, all bolstered by misleading and erroneous statistics.

We’ve observed inaccurate papers being published by a single source, and watched how this misinformation grows into factoids on the Internet, subsequently appearing in multiple presentations. Most frustrating of all, we’ve waited for the organic and related industries to mature and to develop a cohesive communication strategy, one that works for all cotton professionals.

That’s because we all own the problem. It’s “all in the family,” and the family’s last name is “Cotton.” Organic cotton, Fair Trade cotton, Bt cotton … We are all related. As far as one can tell, however, there has been no such strategy to date, unless you consider “Mine is good because yours is bad” a good long-term communication strategy.

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You can read the rest of this article and dozens of others when the 2011 Cotton International Annual Edition is published. Be sure to watch for it in your mailbox in January 2011!

 

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