Promoting cotton by-products in Eastern and Southern Africa: Lessons from a United Nations technical assistance project

摘要

In many African countries, cotton production has languished in the two decades since liberalisation (Tschirley et al, 2009]. Many factors contributed to this decline, perhaps none more fundamental than farmers deciding that other crops are more profitable to grow than cotton (Baffes, 2009). In many African countries, limited value addition constrains the prices paid to farmers: Nearly all lint is exported, leaving cottonseed oil expression as the only additional source of value-added income that canbe factored into producer prices. Strategies to revive cotton production must therefore increase value addition, to expand the income pool from which to remunerate farmers.