Cotton Council International (CCI), the Memphis-based National Cotton Council's (NCC) export promotions arm, celebrated 50 years of dedication to increasing exports of U.S. cotton, cottonseed and their products with a reception at Union Station in Washington, D.C.
Keynote speakers at the event included: The Honorable Thad Cochran, Chairman, Committee on Appropriations, United States Senate; and Hunter H. Moorhead, Special Assistant to the President for Agriculture, Trade and Food Assistance.
CCI President David Burns, a North Carolina producer, said that at CCI's inception in 1956, the industry was in crisis: stocks were the highest in recent memory, man-made fibers were on the move and exports were the lowest they had been in a decade. That year U.S. cotton exporters shipped a total of only 2.2 million bales.
The supply-demand industry crisis of the 1950's led to the NCC signing the first “cooperator agreement” with the United States Department of Agriculture in 1955, and this led in 1956 to the incorporation of a new organization called Cotton Council International. CCI's focus was to be – and still remains – export market development.
“By comparison, today's global mill demand for cotton is more than four times greater than in 1956,” Burns said. “For the 2005-2006 marketing year, the U.S. is projected to export nearly 17 million bales, which translates to more than a seven-fold increase in exports compared with 1956 and represents around seventy percent of current U.S. production.”
Cotton Council International
marketing@alchempro.com
