EPA Approves XtendiMax Herbicide With VaporGrip Technology For In-Crop Use The Environmental Protection Agency has approved XtendiMax herbicide with VaporGrip Technology, a low-volatility dicamba formulation, for in-crop use with Roundup Ready 2 Xtend soybeans and Bollgard II XtendFlex cotton. Farmers...

Editor’s Note: The Southern Southeastern Annual Meeting will be held Jan. 18-22, 2017, at The Westin in Charlotte, N.C. This organization represents cotton growers and ginners throughout Alabama, Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia. Every year, more...

Sixteen years ago, I was a college student at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, two hours away from my family’s cotton and peanut farm on the Texas Rolling Plains, searching for long-term significance – and a part-time job. As I...

Tennessee cotton consultant wins the $20,000 Transform My Community grand prize for the Gibson County Carl Perkins Center. By Carroll Smith Editor “A hundred years from now, nobody will remember who I was, what I did or how much money I...

Considering the present value of projected net cash flows relative to an initial investment is a useful capital budgeting application By Kelly Lange Texas Tech University Agricultural production often requires significant investment in assets, such as tractors, irrigation systems and land....

A sold-out audience of the most influential executives in the global cotton fiber and textile business, representing 26 countries, attended the ninth Sourcing USA Summit last month in California. Who conducts the Summit? Cotton Council International (CCI) hosts the biennial Summit...

According to the ancient Roman calendar, which recognized only 10 months by name, March denoted the beginning of the year. One theory is that it was given this designation to coincide with the onset of the agricultural cycle. December,...

The 2017 Beltwide Cotton Conferences (BWCC) can help its attendees improve production, processing and marketing efficiency by providing them with insight into the latest available tools and research findings. Those planning to attend the concurrent conferences, set for Jan. 4-6...

Cotton research at the U.S. Department of Agriculture-Agricultural Research Service Arid-Land Agricultural Research Center in Maricopa, Ariz., ensures that systems benefitting agriculture in arid and semi-arid Western regions are also important throughout the United States. The Arid-Land Agricultural Research Center...

Commentary By Blake Hurst Missouri Farm Bureau When the elections are over and the U.S. Congress returns to work, it’s time for regulatory reform. Why should that be a top priority of the new Congress? Well, let’s talk about Charlie and John. Charlie...

This year marks the 10th anniversary of Cotton Incorporated’s Blue Jeans Go Green denim recycling program, an initiative that diverts denim garments from landfills and upcycles them. Manufacturing partner Bonded Logic Inc. in Chandler, Ariz., turns them into UltraTouch...

The new Farmer of the Year was selected by three judges who visited his farm and the farms of other state winners during early August. The judges this year included Clark Garland, longtime University of Tennessee Extension agricultural economist from Maryville, Tenn.; farmer Thomas Porter Jr., of Concord, N.C., who was the overall winner in 2011; and Charles Snipes, retired Extension weed scientist from Greenville, Miss. Garland says Wildy impressed the judges with his innovative farm management and crop marketing practices. “David is an outstanding manager of land, labor, production inputs and capital,” he says. “His diversified farming operation features a wide assortment of high-yielding and profitable agronomic crops.” The judges were also impressed with how members of the Wildy family have been able to strengthen agriculture in the Southeast by sharing their farming resources with the research and education communities. “Wildy family members hold key positions in this farming business, and they are responsible for much of the farm’s overall success,” Garland says. “They are consistently achieving their short- and long-term strategic farming goals, and these goals involve the entire family.”

Although export of raw cotton has become essential to U.S. cotton producers’ economic well-being, the National Cotton Council continues its longstanding work for our domestic textile industry. How about assistance in the legislative arena? n A major effort is the NCC’s work to maintain the highly successful “Economic Assistance to Users of Upland Cotton” program first introduced in 2008 farm law and reauthorized in the 2014 bill. This program makes a payment of 3 cents per pound to U.S. textile manufacturers for all upland cotton consumed. Payments must be used for specific purposes such as acquisition, construction, installation, modernization, development, conversion, or expansion of land, plant buildings, equipment, facilities or machinery. More recently, the NCC has been working with the Washington D.C.-based National Council of Textile Organizations (NCTO) and key lawmakers to make sure the Berry Amendment is not weakened in the FY16 National Defense Authorization Act. That Amendment requires the Department of Defense and the Department of Homeland Security to purchase textiles and apparel made with 100 percent U.S. fiber and labor. Likewise, the NCC, NCTO and others have conveyed to lawmakers the critical need for Export-Import Bank Reauthorization. The Ex-Im Bank provides important financing for the U.S. textile industry and its ability to export products.

I was watching a college football game recently when a young player, who had not spent much scoring time in the end zone, made an amazing touchdown. He began celebrating in a fashion the official deemed “excessive” and was...

Delivered As Promised The menu of cotton varieties from which to choose in 2017 includes a host of high-yielding, good quality selections. To help you get started, seed companies from across the Cotton Belt provided information about their headliners on...