Cotton

Fiber characteristics

Cotton is breathable and absorbent, making it a great fabric for summer-weight apparel and knitting (it's less ideal for colder months). Cotton is also highly versatile.

In fact, it's the most widely used natural fiber in fabrics for apparel, quilting, home decorating, and more.

Cotton fibers can be short-staple or long-staple (as in Egyptian cotton or Pima cotton).

Conventional cotton

Modern cotton production is totally dependent on chemical intervention to meet the enormous demand in the market. Environmentally speaking, conventional cotton is a disaster! The following facts come from the Organic Exchange:

• cotton makes up half the world’s textile sales
• it uses 25% of the world’s insecticides and 10% of world pesticides (including probable carcinogens) on only 5% of the world’s farmland
• it takes 1/3 pound of pesticides and fertilizers to produce enough cotton for a single T-shirt
• the entire life cycle of cotton is dominated by chemical intervention: insecticides, herbicides, fungicides, defoliants … many of which are descendants of the toxic agents used during World Wars I and II
• 70% of US-grown cotton is genetically modified
• although cotton is regulated as a non-food crop, the majority of cotton ends up in our food supply as cotton byproducts fed to beef and dairy cattle, and cottonseed oil used in processed foods!

Organic cotton

Growing organic cotton is a much bigger effort, but it's worth the cost -- both in environmental terms and for the benefits of knowing the fiber we put on our skin is free from pesticides and toxic dyes. Organic cotton:

• uses untreated seeds (no insecticides or fungicides)
• never uses genetically modified seeds
• builds strong soil through crop rotation, rather than relying on synthetic fertilizer
• physically removes weeds rather than relying on herbicides
• uses beneficial insects and lure crops to manage pests
• relies on seasonal freezes to remove foliage from cotton, rather than chemicals
• must be processed separately from conventional cotton, including separating the fiber from the seed, spinning, knitting and sewing
• if bleached, hydrogen peroxide is used rather than chlorine
• dyes used are the least harmful possible (to people and planet), and may include low-impact, fiber-reactive, and natural dyes

Primary organic cotton producers are Turkey (39%), India (32%), the United States (8%) and China (7%).

For further reading

The Organic Exchange

About Organic Cotton (The Organic Exchange)

Organic Trade Association Fiber Standards

Global Organic Textile Standard (“GOTS”) 

Sustainable Cotton Project 

Sustainable cotton is another approach, blending conventional and organic practices. Here's a clip from the Sustainable Cotton Project's video about sustainable cotton farming in California’s San Joaquin Valley, produced by the Community Alliance with Family Farmers (CAFF).