I 







A FORTNIGHTLY REVIEW 



OF THE 



IMPERIAL DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE FOR THE WEST INDIES. 



Vol. XV. No. 358. 



BARBADOS, .JANUARY 1.3, 191(5. 



Price IcJ. 



CONTENTS. 



The War and Cotton Production. 



^ROWERS of cotton, in .ill parts of the 

 )Empire, will read witli much interest the 

 ; recent views of Professor Todd on the war 

 and the world's cotton crops.* According to this 

 anthority, the prospects of high prices for cotton are 

 extremely favourable, and, rather than speak of 

 reducing the acreage, we should agitate and make 

 every effort for an extension. 'Every penny', says 

 Professor Todd, 'that the British Empire invests now in 

 cotton growing, either in education or engineering, will 

 be a profitable investment in the future, and the sooner 



♦Special article in the Bulldin of the Imperial Instilnte, 

 Vol. XIII, No. 3. 



the investment is made, the greater, as well as the 

 quicker, will be the return. What we shall want after 

 the war is not merely a British Cotton Growing 

 Association with a capital of a paltry £500,000, but an 

 organization of the size of a State Department with 

 all the combined resources of the British Empire 

 behind it, and a capital of about as much as we are 

 spending on this war in three days, say £10,000,000.' 



The circumstances underlying these conclusions 

 may be summarized. First of all, it must be pointed 

 out that, according to Professor Todd, for five seasons 

 out of ten before the war, the world's cotton consump- 

 tion was actually in excess of the world's crops. Prices, 

 therefore, have risen to a very high level, as is shown 

 by the fact that the price of American Middling has 

 risen from iV7()d. for the period 1.S94-95 to LS9.S-99, 

 to 7-Wd. for the period 1909-10 to 191.S-14. During 

 the season before the war the average price was 7'26(/. 

 After the outbreak of hostilities, with an American 

 crop of 17,000,000 bales in view (the largest on record), 

 prices fell steadily until in December, American Mid- 

 dling touched 4|(^.: but from that point a really 

 marvellous recover}' sn't in, which has now carried the 

 price well above fkl. 



The cause of this recovery was due to several 

 things — to the country's getting a certain amount 

 of new btisiness at the expen.se of the enemy, to 

 the briskness of the home demand, and to a ne .v and 

 special demand for gun-cotton. 



But the downward rush of prices in the autumn 

 of 1914 resulted in a .serious curtailment of the 

 world's acreage under cotton this year. General 

 concensus of opinion places the reduction of acreage in 

 America at 15 per cent.; allowing for similar reductions 

 in other countries, it is likely that the world's supply 



