COTTON 175 



suffering largely from the malpractice of watering the 

 ginned cotton prior to pressing. At all the most im- 

 portant centres one can see hose-pipes being used freely, 

 say 'half an hour over 100 loose bales, and, in spite of 

 the remonstrances made by the spinners of the world, 

 it is surprising that the Government of India cannot see 

 its way to suppress this practice, which has been termed 

 a " fraud " by the Secretary of State for India. 



Madras. 



As regards Madras, an improvement has undoubtedly 

 taken place in the quality of Northerns, which the 

 Agricultural Department has improved by plant selection. 

 A slighter improvement has taken place in the Western 

 cotton, but, unfortunately, owing to lack of staff, hardly 

 any work has been carried on by the Department of 

 Agriculture for the improvement of Cambodia. When 

 this Cambodia was introduced it had a ginning out-turn 

 of 44 per cent., now it varies from 33 to 35 per cent. 

 With plant selection and importation of new supplies of 

 seed good work might be done by agricultural experts. 

 Spinners complain very much of the falling-off in quality 

 of Cambodia cotton. This cotton has i in. staple, and 

 is a phenomenal yielder, as 500 Ib. of lint per acre is 

 quite a common crop. As Indian cotton generally yields 

 only 100 Ib. per acre, it will be readily understood that 

 many ryots are using all kinds of unsuitable land for the 

 purpose of trying this wonderful cotton. Unfortunately, 

 the Co-operative Credit Societies in Madras are not yet 

 sufficiently developed to take up agricultural work. A 

 great improvement would take place if the Department 

 of Agriculture were to sell selected seed on credit in this 

 Presidency. 



Burma. 



So far little attention has been paid to Burma cotton. 

 The Government state that about 47,000 bales are grown 

 every year, but last year, and again this year, between 

 70,000 and 80,000 bales were exported. Burmese cotton, 

 as now marketed, is a mixture of long and short varieties. 

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