b PACKING AND MABKETING OF COTTON. 



of their industries. The world's demands are measured by 20,000,000 

 bales of 500 pounds each annually, and the natural increase steadily 

 advances at the rate of 400,000 bales per annum, keeping pace with 

 the world's material and moral advancement. 



The United States furnishes approximately 75 per cent of the 

 world's requirements and must necessarily continue in that relation, 

 for the simple reason that no individual country or combination of 

 countries can change or prevent natural conditions that furnish the 

 United States with the advantages and facilities essential to the suc- 

 cessful growth of cotton required in the manufacture of fabrics to 

 meet cosmopolitan needs and habits. In these circumstances it is 

 apparent that all who want must come to the United States for cotton, 

 and necessity compels them to accept the product in such form as it 

 may be presented. If the spinners of Europe could obtain cotton 

 elsewhere in needed quantity and quality, they would not come to the 

 United States and accept the unsightly and antiquated package with 

 its wastefulness and loss, its fruitful sources for exasperating con- 

 tentions, and liability to expensive litigation. 



DTADEQUATE AND INSUmOnaSIT COVEEING. 



No commodity that enters into the domestic or foreign trade of 

 any country is so carelessly prepared and so inadequately covered as 

 American cotton. In the world's markets it is prized for its inherent 

 qualities and execrated for the slovenly manner in which it is pre- 

 sented, and this condition is universally admitted by those who culti- 

 vate it, as well as by those who are responsible for its preparation 

 and transportation. We have in cOtton a valuable commodity, the 

 growth of which is peculiar to the southern section of the United 

 States, and the possession of which is essential to the industrial and 

 physical wants of every civilized people; and although the demand 

 for it is constant and imperative, aggregating in value $1,000,000,000, 

 it receives less care than commodities of least value in the category 

 of commerce. The importance of cotton to the industries of this 

 country need not be recounted, but it is pertinent to recite the figures 

 that describe its importance to the nation. 



COTTON A LEADING FACTOR IN FOREIGN TRADE. 



In the calendar year 1911 cotton contributed $517,000,000 to the 

 volume of our foreign trade, to which should be added $42,000,000 

 for cottonseed products. In that year the value of animals, bread- 

 stuffs of every description, meat and dairy products, tobacco, fruits 

 and nuts (these several items including the principal farm products 

 entering into foreign commerce) aggregated $390,572,616. Iron 

 and steel and their manufactures constitute another large and valu- 

 able group in our foreign trade, $250,000,000 worth having been 

 sent abroad last year. The excess of exports over imports in 1911 

 was $559,459,516, that sum constituting the so-called balance of 

 trade. Combining the two groups above named gives an aggregate 

 of $640,000,000 in round numbers, which is about $81,000,000 greater 

 •than the balance of trade. The cotton exported brought to the 

 United States in exchange $659,000,000, a sum about equal to the 



