Apparel Online India Magazine July 1st Issue 2018 | Page 22

TEX-FILE APPAREL RESOURCES NEWSLETTERS FACEBOOK FRIENDS To subscribe, send us an email at [email protected] Join more than 10,000 people who are already fans of Apparel Resources on facebook. Search for Apparel Resources at https://www.facebook.com/apparelresources/ BE HAPPY! COTTON PRODUCTION ON THE RISE There is good news for the industry. Thanks to the rise in cotton cultivation area in the country, all organisations that are keeping a close watch on cotton production have predicted a sizable increase this year. According to the estimate made by Confederation of Indian Textile Industry (CITI), cotton crop production is likely to witness an increase of 8.11 per cent to 373 lakh bales (of 170 kg each) compared to last year. The increase is not solely due to better farming methods but also due an increase in cotton cultivation area. This year, the cotton cultivation area increased to 122.59 lakh hectares from 108.45 lakh hectares in the previous year. New cotton season in India starts from October every year and this increase will help the entire supply chain. R eacting to the increase, Sanjay Jain, Chairman, CITI shared the latest update on the scenario, “Estimated balance- sheet for 2017-18 shows production as 373 lakh bales, imports at 15 lakh bales and exports at 70 lakh bales. Further consumption is estimated to be 316 lakh bales (including non-mill consumption of 19 lakh bales) against 306 lakh bales in 2016-17.” After an analysis on the production of yarn data reported by the office of the Textile Commissioner from October 2017 to April 2018, CITI is of the opinion that high prices of cotton domestically and internationally would further force the consumption to either remain stagnant or be slightly on the lower side. Hence, consumption Sanjay Jain, Chairman, CITI 22 Apparel Online India | JULY 1-15, 2018 | www.apparelresources.com figures should not exceed beyond 316 lakh bales. Even the figure of 316 lakh bales is already higher than the estimate of cotton consumption of 309 lakh bales based upon the consumption of first seven months for the cotton season 2017-18 as reported by the Textile Commissioner. In the meanwhile, the Cotton Association of India (CAI) has estimated cotton crop for the ongoing 2017-18 season at 365 lakh bales of 170 kgs each, which is higher by 5 lakh bales from its previous estimate – 3 lakh bales in Gujarat, 1 lakh bale in Karnataka, 50,000 bales in Andhra Pradesh, and 25,000 bales each in the states of Madhya Pradesh and Tamil Nadu. This estimated increase in production figures is mainly due to the realisation of higher yields more particularly in the State of Gujarat. This predicted increase is very good news to the industry, as there has been a lot of rumours that the recent increase in cotton prices in India is due to shortage of cotton. But Sanjay feels that this increase was due to the recent increase in cotton prices across the globe (led by China and USA weather fears impacting the 2018-19 crop size negatively). “It has nothing to do with the shortage of cotton as feared by many. To give a better perspective, if we see increase in ZCE, Cotlook A and MCX since 1st April 2018 till date, the increase is 14%, 12% and 13%, respectively which clearly shows that Indian prices are just in line with global price movements. Further it’s