Like Cotton Itself, Adversity Makes Our Industry Stronger

After what seemed like a remarkable run of relative stability in the cotton industry, in hindsight, these last few years have brought their share of challenges. And while those challenges have exacted a heavy toll on the industry, they have also brought opportunities to improve.

When I joined this industry, I learned that the best cotton grows under somewhat difficult circumstances. Obviously, the environment can’t be too harsh, but nor do you want them be too easy, or the roots won’t grow deep and strong. The best cotton is produced when the plant has to stretch itself and overcome difficult conditions.

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It is the same for the cotton industry as a whole, and I’ve seen it in person here in Bangkok at the Cotton International 2012 Global Summit. During the Risk Management panel, I listened as professionals from the cotton and textile industries discussed the hardships caused by extreme volatility and collaboratively discussed ways to overcome them. There were no angry words or accusations, just an exchange of views on how to overcome the difficulties we all face.

Challenges bring out the best in us, and most importantly, they force us to work together to overcome them. The fact is that your business will not – cannot – succeed in the long term if your partners and customers don’t find success as well. What happened in 2008 was unlike anything that the industry had seen in more than 150 years. Yet here we are, just four years after that “once in a lifetime” event, and the volatility was longer and more dramatic than what occurred in 2008.

In the coming weeks and months, Cotton International will be sharing the strategies and insights that resulted from the discussions that took place at the Global Summit. They are the blueprint to a better future.

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Cotton is, and will continue to be, the most popular and sustainable fiber on the planet. It will overcome the challenges of market volatility, and competition from food crops, and challenges from synthetic fibers … and it will do it because we are committed to working together to find solutions that work for all stakeholders.

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