Reversing the Trend

By Jim.Robinson|March 16, 2010

As most people in the cotton world entered 2010 with better hopes, this could not have been the case for cotton growers in Turkey. Why is it that a country that, until four or five years ago, had been identified as one of the three countries (along with China and Brazil) where cotton production had a good potential for significant increase, can now hardly be counted among the major cotton producers?

Yes, Turkey still deserves to be called a “major cotton country” — not as a producer, but as a major cotton importer, coming second after China.

Ever since Turkey’s extremely dry spells, coupled with severe drought and increased costs during the cotton growing summer periods of 2006 and 2007, the overall cotton production in the country has witnessed a dramatic fall. The main factor for this fall seems to be the loss of confidence in cotton’s ultimate future in this country, both in the farmers’ eyes and in the government’s mind. Indeed, the premium payment system that has been in place since the 1998-99 season, even at recent comparatively high levels, has not given a positive response towards improvement in cotton tonnage.

Can Turkey reverse this declining trend in cotton production in 2010? We will see. One major setback facing the growers is the gradual downfall of the one-time giant agricultural sales cooperatives and their upper level unions. As a result of their restructuring process, they have largely lost their market-playing power and ability to shelter growers. If something is not done very soon, the unions will become extinct and growers will need to find alternative shelters.

Looking at the cotton consumption side, despite the global financial and economic crises, and despite the disappearance of some of the large textile factories, the textile and clothing industry has been dynamic and swift to adapt to the changing conditions. Even with a 20 percent drop in exports in 2009 compared to the previous year’s export values, Turkey remains as one of the major textile and clothing exporting countries in the world. These findings can be interpreted as good indications that cotton consumption, and hence cotton imports, will not fall dramatically in 2010.