2 BULLETIN 1111, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 
Lack of pure seed is responsible for a general failure to utilize 
superior varieties of cotton and for enormous industrial and eco- 
nomic wastes through the production of inferior fiber and the manu- 
facture of weak, perishable fabrics. The cotton industry absorbs the 
activities of millions of people, which could be applied to better ad- 
vantage in raising better crops of cotton and making better goods. 
The producing and manufacturing operations are on a low plane of 
efficiency, working with raw material of needlessly inferior quality 
because the seed is poor. It is self-evident that the breeding of su- 
perior varieties does not result in the improvement of the cotton in- 
dustry unless good seed becomes available and is used generally as 
the basis of production. Seed is necessary to raise cotton, and good 
seed must be planted if good fiber is to be obtained. The pure-seed 
problems must be solved, as well as the breeding problems, before 
superior varieties can be utilized. 
Through the simple expedient of adhering to one variety in each 
community, the present degenerate mixed stocks could be replaced 
with pure seed of superior varieties. Cooperation, to the extent of 
agreeing to plant the same variety of cotton, is necessary if farmers 
are to have regular supplies of pure seed for their own use or to sell. 
The individual farmer, struggling alone with the idea that he can 
improve his crop and get a higher price in growing better fiber, is 
much more likely to fail than to succeed, but the prospect is altered 
completely when a whole community of farmers adopts and maintains 
an improved variety. Through community action it is possible to 
observe the necessary precautions, so that superior varieties can be 
preserved, increased, and utilized. This has been demonstrated in 
the striking progress made in recent years in the Salt River Valley 
of Arizona, where the growers have specialized on a single variety. 
Considered as a means of utilizing superior varieties, community 
organization is as practical a need and as definitely related to the 
improvement of production as the invention of a new implement to 
cultivate the crop, a new fertilizer to stimulate the growth of the 
plants, or a new spray to keep off pests or diseases. Farmers and 
agricultural promoters would understand readily if superior varie- 
ties of cotton had to be grown on particular soils or special cultural 
treatment had to be given, but one-variety community organization 
is also to be reckoned as a condition or requirement for the produc- 
tion of good fiber. Though not so generally or so easily recognized 
by those who have been accustomed to think only of the farm opera- 
tions, the community conditions may reduce or increase the profits 
of production as definitely as the other conditions of soil, rainfall, 
weevil infestation, or labor supply. 
