Mali records highest cotton production

Mali has recorded its largest cotton production of more than 760,000 tons for the 2021-2022 season.

The President of the Transition Assimi Goita declared the record production on Saturday, figures that place Mali as the top cotton producer on the African continent.

According to the government, record production was made possible by maintaining a subsidy on agricultural inputs, maintaining a minimal shift in the cost of cotton seen among other initiatives.

In September 2021, the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) had indicated in its report that "Mali will be the largest cotton producer in Africa for the 2021/2022 season, followed by Benin, Côte d'Ivoire and Burkina Faso.

Mali planted a record 795,000 hectares (ha), up 630,000 hectares (382%) from last year's crop, the document noted.

In addition, the U.S. report explained that "Côte d'Ivoire also planted a record 460,000 ha, while Benin and Burkina Faso each planted more than 600,000 hectares this year."

At the end of the 2019/2020 season, Mali's cotton production totaled 700,000 tons, up 6.6 percent from 2018/2019.

The volume harvested for the 2019/2020 campaign, makes Mali for the second consecutive year, the second-largest producer of white gold in Africa behind Benin (714,000 tons).

Cotton producers boycotted the 2020/2021 cotton season following a misunderstanding with the authorities over the price of cotton seeds set by the government.

Finally, in 2018, Mali was ranked as the leading cotton producer on the continent with 725,000 tons of cotton seeds, according to data from the Malian Textile Development Company (CMDT).