170 COTTON 



mills of the whole world on March i, 1914, indicate the 

 increased use to which Indian cotton has been put during 

 the last year. 



The question of the cotton supply should be looked 

 upon from an international point of view, as all the 

 nations are interdependent. 



THE PRODUCTION OF COTTON IN INDIA. 



The International Cotton Federation has at all times 

 urged, in the first instance, the growing of larger quan- 

 tities of cotton in India. Although the question of quality 

 has been looked upon as a point of secondary importance, 

 yet it is one which would naturally receive the attention 

 of the growers. 



The results achieved in regard to quality in Madras, 

 in the Punjab, in Sind and Guzerat are very promising, 

 for taking these together we have had during last season 

 a crop of some 300,000 bales which are of a quality equal 

 to Middling American, though, owing to defective pick- 

 ing and mixing, the price obtained for these cottons may 

 not have been as high as it might otherwise have been. 



It is a mistaken idea to suppose that India can produce 

 only coarse and short cottons. It is an historical fact 

 that India used to produce cotton from which the finest 

 kinds of tissues were woven, and it is only through 

 mixing of different cotton varieties and the lack of 

 scientific supervision that the Indian cottons have 

 deteriorated. I am, however, able to state the experi- 

 ence of many cotton spinners to the effect that the Indian 

 cottons have improved again of late years in quality, no 

 doubt due to the activities of the agricultural experts, and 

 there is every reason to hope that further progress will 

 be made in this direction. 



The tour which I undertook during last winter through 

 the Indian cotton-growing provinces extended to Sind, 

 the Punjab, North-West Frontier Province, the United 

 Provinces, Madras Presidency, Central Provinces, Burma, 

 Assam, and part of the Bombay Presidency. Thanks to 

 the excellent arrangements made by the India Office, I 

 was able to make a pretty exhaustive survey of the con- 



