Cotton prices shoot up on short supply

Farmers have completed sowing in 70 per cent of the 900,000 hectares they sowed in last year, according to P Santosh Kumar, a cotton trader. Around 55 per cent of it has already germinated, he adds.

If rains arrive in a week or another 10 days, cotton hectarage would touch 1.1 million. But if rains are delayed, a part of the crop may die. If that happens, the farmers would go for re-sowing, he said.

Farmers, traders, exporters and millers hope for a phenomenal increase in cotton prices when the fresh crop hits the market in October as shortage is expected to continue.

At one point, lint (cotton without seeds) was priced at Rs 30,000 a candy at Guntur. This week, the price is around Rs 28,000. Cotton kapas are now available at Rs 3,000-3,400 a quintal. Crop scarcity has forced exporters to release their stored cotton to the domestic market.

Around 25 per cent of the summer cotton crop (audri or ac cotton), raised in Nellore and Prakasam districts, is expected to reach the market soon.