Cotton Production Guideline in Ethiopia

Abstract

Cotton is one of the major cash crop in Ethiopia and extensively grown in both irrigated and rain-fed areas in large and small scale production. It is a major input for the textile industry. Cotton plays a key role in the national economy through generation of direct and indirect employment for the ever growing population of the country both in the agricultural and industrial sectors of cotton production and processing. In Ethiopia, cotton-producing areas with high potential accounts 65%, while the remaining is medium potential areas. On the other hand, of the total land under cotton cultivation, 45% owned by private farms, 33% by small holders, and the rest 22% is state-owned farms. Werer Agricultural Research Center under Ethiopian Institute of Agricultural Research has been making a maximum effort to the development of country’s agricultural sector through generating several improved cotton technologies and information by different research disciplines since its establishment. Since the 1960s’ a total of 42 conventional, hybrids and BT cotton varieties have been released through introduction, collection and hybridization followed pedigree selection. This production manual try to avails scientific knowledge techniques and experiences developed in research to the community facing problem in cotton production. Under the thirteen chapters it comprises an overview of diverse research efforts in variety development, agronomic practices and plant protection as well as others contemporary science are tried to be covered. With the available cotton production technologies at hand, the dissemination of knowledge to the end users concerning the cotton production constraints needs to be estimated at the grassroots. Optimizing yields and fiber qualities of the crop has been insufficiently exploited due to lower efficiency of producers. Despite the continued efforts made since the inception of the cotton crop research in our country, the fruits of this efforts had not yet become realized. However, the basis for growing cotton based on a sound scientific research foundation in a way that would ensure the best practices were observed. Therefore, the brief presentation of topics in this manual will give an overview to concerned governmental and non-governmental sectors; incite and instigate researchable areas; and motivates researchers to come up with workable means for cotton production in technology development and other practices in order to surpass cotton production through focusing in yields and fiber qualities trait on cotton. The cotton research team is hopeful that this document will guide and align the efforts in providing the information for the inherent genetic performance of the available cotton varieties, agronomic practice, plant protection and other contemporary science of cotton production to ensure production and productivity.