Uses: Organic Cotton can rightly be called the most skin-friendly, most soothing, and most harmless natural fiber. While conventional cotton can sometimes be irritating to newborn skins, Organic Cotton is never like that. It is the ideal material for protecting and cleaning newborn babies, particularly for making clothes, bandages, covering and cleaning wounds, baby crib beddings, baby clothes, towels, and thousands of such things. It can also be safely used in surgeries where contamination from any source can be fatal. Organic Cotton Seed Oil, a byproduct of Organic Cotton, has wide uses in snacks and in feed for livestock.
Market: You can have a very good idea of the market for Organic Cotton from the production figures displayed above. Even with such impressive growth in production, the total Organic Cotton production is still falling short of meeting the global demand. It is near 0.55% of the total global cotton production. Some studies forecast that the total global market of Organic Cotton by the end of 2008 is expected to cross $2.6 Billion USD. That’s amazing!
Myths & Facts: Some people are of the belief (or they are made to believe by the promoters of conventional cotton) that conventional cotton has better quality than Organic Cotton. However, in fact, it is just the other way round. Organic Cotton is of far better quality than non-Organic Cotton. When you tell them this, they will raise another point. They will say that conventional cotton farming results in more production. That was true even a few years ago, but not anymore. It is true that cotton is very prone to infestation and fungal infections and even a few years back, the conventional cotton growers who used lots of synthetic insecticides, pesticides, fungicides, and fertilizers, naturally enjoyed more production. That was then when advanced techniques of organic farming were limited to research. Now, the scenario has changed. Egypt, a major cotton-producing nation, has performed a miracle. By implementing advanced organic farming techniques, it has cut down its usage of artificial fertilizers and pesticides by more than 90% and achieved a growth of 30% in production. Therefore, Organic Cotton is commercially far more beneficial than conventional non-Organic Cotton.
Benefits: Apart from the commercial gains discussed above, Organic Cotton is health-friendly and environmentally-friendly, unlike its conventional counterpart. I think that only these two reasons are more than sufficient to switch over to Organic Cotton, because health and environment should be the prime concerns for any reasonable human being.
Cultivation: Here is a comparative study of cultivation techniques adopted in cultivating conventional non-Organic Cotton and Organic Cotton.
| Conventional Cotton Farming | Organic Cotton Farming |
| Land is not detoxified | Land is invariably detoxified |
| Artificial/chemical fertilizers are used | Organic fertilizers/compost/manure is used |
| Artificial/chemical pesticides & insecticides are used | Organic/herbal pesticides and insecticides are used. Bio-controlling of insects/pests is also done. |
| Seeds are treated with fungicides & insecticides | Seeds are not treated |
| Mono crop culture is practiced | Crop rotation is practiced |
| Genetically Modified Organisms are used | Genetically Modified Organisms are not used |
| Soil lacks organic matter & cannot retain water & a lot of irrigational water goes wasted/drained out | Soil has more water retention capacity due to presence of organic matter & water is least wasted |
| Weeds are destroyed using herbicides/weedicides | Weeds are manually or mechanically removed |
| Has fatal affects on many friendly small animals & insects like owls, snakes, earthworms, frogs etc. | Does not affect their habitat. Rather, it encourages their dwelling. |
| Adversely affects ecological balance, both due to deforestation & extensive use of toxic chemicals | Affects adversely (as trees or forests are cleared for making space for farming), but not that much. |
| Chemical defoliation | Defoliation is seasonal/natural or by water control |
Certifiers: Here is a list of certifiers whose certificates you may find on the certified Organic Cotton goods;
- Global Organic Textile Standards (GOTS)
- USDA National Organic Program (NOP)
- European Organic Regulations (EU 2092/91)
- Export Certificates for Japan (JAS Equivalent)
- Indian National Programme for Organic Production (NPOP).
- Quebec Organic Reference Standard (CAAQ)
- Bio Suisse Standards
- IOFAM Basic Standards
- ECOCERT
