TURKEY RANKS SIXTH IN TOTAL COTTON PRODUCTION AND FIFTH IN IMPORTS...

Press release...

Turkey ranks sixth in total cotton production and fifth in total imports...

Turkey earns 27 billion dollars annually and 2 million people directly employed in textile and ready-to-wear sector whose basic raw material is cotton. Averagely 850-950 thousand tons of cotton-producing Turkey should produce an annual 1.6 million tons of cotton in order to meet the needs.

The 78th Plenary Session of the International Cotton Advisory Council (ICAC) was held in Brisbane, Australia on December 2-6, 2019, in which global developments on cotton were evaluated.

The 78th Plenary Session of the International Cotton Advisory Council (ICAC) was attended by the government officials of 28 countries and representatives of 5 International Organizations.  Ministry of Commerce Deputy Director General Musa Demir, Aegean Exporters' Association Coordinator Chairman Jak Eskinazi, Aegean Clothing and Apparel Exporters' Association Chairman Burak Sertbaş presided the Turkish delegation.

Main theme is 'Global Leadership; Pushing the Boundaries of Cotton'

Jak Eskinazi, Coordinator of Aegean Exporters' Association, who provided up-to-date information on cotton production, consumption, stocks, exports, imports and prices and the projections of 2019/20 season, sustainability in cotton production and in sectors where cotton is used naturally, global mega trends for cotton, plant breeding also stated that many open and intermediate sessions were held on issues such as ensuring productivity and high quality in production, application and virtual reality developed for soil and phytosanitary, which were planned to be implemented in Asia and Africa in the first stage and plant training.

Stating that Turkey's cotton production takes sixth place in the world just after India, China, the US, Brazil and Pakistan Eskinazi said, "Despite being a big player in cotton production, it can not provide the need of our 82 million domestic market and annual 27 billion dollars from export of textiles and our garment industry. Today, we need 1.6 million tons of cotton annually, we should support the production and the producer to meet our cotton need that will reach to 2 million tons in the future."

Cotton to be monitored with Blockchain technology...

EİB President Eskinazi, who emphasized that the preferences of consumers entered a process shaped production, concluded his words as follows: "Customers are increasing their pressure on brands in terms of traceability and transparency. The consumer questions the stories of the products he buys, the authenticity and reliability of the products. This process is becoming more and more evident. Serving with different methods on traceability issues; With nano technology, the particles were placed into the fiber and traceability by blockchain technology, determination of cotton's DNA and subsequent traceability and traceability were ensured and the fingerprints of cotton grown in each country based on the differences in chemical minerals in the soil according to countries. We have to do our production in a way that meets these expectations."