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WELCOME TO OUR NEW EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE

ACSA held its Annual General Meeting in November. Cliff White of OmniCotton Australia will serve as ACSA’s Chairman for the coming year. He will be ably supported by Roger Tomkins of S&G Cotton as Senior Vice Chairman, Michael O’Rielley of QC Olam as Vice Chairman, Matthew Bradd of Ecom Cotton as immediate past Chair and Tracey Byrne-Morrison as Secretariat.



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BETTER COTTON

In early November ACSA attended a BCI conference in Shanghai, China. The conference was jointly sponsored by ACSA and Cotton Australia and had a very impressive attendance of nearly 300 people, many representing spinning mills. The Australian delegation consisted of Cliff White, Tony Geitz and Tom Zhang from ACSA, Brooke Summers, Simon Corish, Nigel and Beth Burnett representing Cotton Australia. 

Opening proceedings, Allan McClay (BCI CEO) gave an update on BCI and advised that they now have 1,163 members of whom 1,008 are supplier/merchant members. Through their partners, BCI trained 1.6 million farmers of whom 1.5 million received licenses. These farmers came from 23 countries on five continents. BCI farmers produced 2.5 million metric tons of Better Cotton lint on 3.5 million hectares of land - this is enough cotton to make 2.5 billion pairs of jeans.

Sponsorship of this event enabled the BCI to provide a clear focus on the Australian cotton industry and its increasing involvement with BCI. ACSA gave an update on the Australian industry while Cotton Australia spoke about collaboration and sharing of good farm practices. Additionally there was a grower forum with Australian and Chinese growers sharing their knowledge and there were some large differences as you can imagine!



 

Two brand members, H&M and C&A gave very interesting presentations. H&M are apparently the largest current user of BCI cotton and are now turning their attention to “renewables” with the aim to be “climate positive” by 2040. C&A’s claim to fame is that they are the largest organic cotton user and want “fashion with a positive impact”. Both brands have a number of buzz statements and both included the “circular economy” as the talk of renewables has definitely become a focus for them. Indeed a considerable amount of their presentations focused on what they were doing in trying to develop renewable products.

BCI certainly seems to be gathering some pace and you could not help but be impressed by this conference and the high energy of the local BCI representatives. It was also very clear that the Australian cotton industry is held in high regard both at a BCI level and the Chinese industry in general so it was not at all surprising to have a great engagement during this meeting. With China poised to remain our number one export destination for years to come participating in such events can only help consolidate Australian cottons position as one of their growths of choice.



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ACSA has commenced its journey into the social media world. Search for us – Australian Cotton Shippers Association – like and follow.



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POSITIVE OUTLOOK

Where did the year go? It’s only a few weeks since ginning finished and we have the 2018 crop in the ground. It’s been an interesting period for the cotton market as the very bearish tone from earlier in the year has been replaced by a slightly more optimistic feel as we come to the last few weeks of 2017. That more positive aspect is being attributed to improved cotton demand from a range of consuming countries and consequently we are finishing 2017 with some attractive cash prices for the 2018 crop.

Quickly reviewing the year, the Australian Cotton Shippers Association had an active year in promoting our cotton in export markets, culminating in November with a joint visit by ACSA and Cotton Australia to attend a BCI Conference in Shanghai. Earlier in the year a delegation visited India, a market that is increasingly looking to Australia for its premium quality requirements. We also managed to make a presentation in Singapore at the annual ICA trade event. ACSA currently has 14 members who all actively promote our cotton on the export stage, a largely unseen function that plays a major role in our supply chain operations. The competition to buy cotton in Australia has never been more fierce, and that supports so many aspects of our local trade, not least of which is the financial impact of over $2 billion going into the local economy.

As we head into 2018 the market is focused on two major factors. Firstly, and the most pressing, is what is happening with the large US crop? In the middle of the year expectations had been for a crop around 19 million bales and this was considered a major bearish factor so you can imagine the surprise when in August the USDA increased the crop size to 20.5 million bales. The market perversely moved higher and here we are at the end of the year feeling comfortable the market can handle such a large crop. What happened? Well for a start the USA has been on a fantastic run of export sales but that has only come about by demand levels for cotton being much better than the market had anticipated.

The demand issue brings us, as always, to China, and what that country will do with their import policy. Having done an excellent job in reducing their burdensome stocks it is only a question of time as to when the authorities will allow more imports. Although taking a reduced percentage, China remains our number one market and likely to remain in that position for many years to come. Having visited China numerous times this year the striking feature is the focus on the environment. That attention is very evident, and pretty much in every meeting we had at some point the discussion reverted to the environment. This environmental focus is having a real impact as it is increasing costs to industry because businesses must become compliant otherwise they run the very real risk of being closed down by the authorities. Such action looks as though it is going to be a positive for cotton as the manmade fibre price increases due to those increased costs. Cotton consumption has increased in China and the hope is that this is maintained.

If we add crop concerns for Pakistan and India, both of whom were supposed to produce excessive crops this year, then it is not difficult to see why the tone of the market has changed. At the time of writing, the ICE Futures market is over 70 cents and the bulls seem to have control. This is a remarkable situation in light of the fact that the USA has produced around 21 million bales, its largest crop in a decade, and yet it seems that most will get sold.

As we look forward to the Australian 2018 crop we have again that optimistic feel to production and hopefully conditions will be a bit more conducive than they were last season. As things stand we could have production around 4.5 million bales and despite the still relatively high stock position in the global market our product should move. Of course, the same old question will still hang over our market – what are the Chinese going to do? Well they have already announced that sales of their reserve stock will again proceed in the March to August period, thus continuing the tightening of the government stock. Will this then require more imports? The market sentiment is that China will definitely have to import more during 2019 but there is a lurking suspicion that something could happen in the second half of 2018. Let’s hope so as that really could provide some fireworks in our market.

2018 is already shaping up to be a big year for ACSA. We are road tripping for most of our meetings this year – Narrabri, Canberra and the Gold Coast. We’ll kick off the first quarter with an export market development visit to Turkey and Bangladesh and act as co-host of the Australian Cotton Conference to be held in August 2018. Stay tuned for more conference updates in the new year!

Wishing everyone a great Christmas, happy new year and safe travels during the holiday season.