India's Oct-Dec cotton supplies drop 15.9 pct y/y - trade body

MUMBAI (Reuters) - Cotton supplies in Indian spot markets fell 15.9 percent from a year earlier to 10.8 million bales between October and December as government's move to scrap high-value currency notes disrupted trading, a leading trade body said on Monday.

In November, Prime Minister Narendra Modi scrapped 500 rupee and 1,000 rupee bills to crackdown on tax dodgers and counterfeiters. [nL4N1D94QI]

The world's biggest cotton producer is likely to harvest 34.1 million bales of cotton in the 2016/17 season, that started on Oct. 1, down 1.1 percent from an earlier estimate, the Cotton Association of India said in a statement.

India had harvested 33.8 million bales in 2015/16.

 

(1 Indian bale = 170 kg)

(Reporting by Rajendra Jadhav; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips)