EMPIRE COTTON GROWING CORPORATION, THE. This body was established in 1921 on the recommendation The. This body was established in 1921 on the recommendation of the Empire Cotton Growing Committee of the Board of Trade to develop fresh cotton fields within the British Empire. It is a body representative both of the industry and of the State. The income of the Corporation is derived in part from a capital con tribution of nearly one million pounds made by the Government, and in part from the proceeds of a levy, originally at the rate of 6d. a bale on all cotton purchased by British spinners, but subse quently reduced first to 3d. and later to id. per bale, owing to the depression in the cotton spinning and manufacturing indus tries.
The British Cotton Growing Association, founded in 1904, is a separate body and works in close alliance with the Corporation. Its chief work in the development of new areas is the handling of cotton, i.e. ginning, baling and marketing. The Corporation is particularly concerned with research and experimental work and the training and supply of experts.
From small beginnings, the amount of cotton grown in the new fields in the British Empire (excluding India) increased to 82,000 bales in 1914, 263,90o in 1924, 431,438 in 1926, and to bales of 400 lbs. in 1938. The significance of these figures will be recognized when it is remembered that 35 years earlier West Africa exported no cotton, Uganda was just settling down after a civil war and was in the throes of sleeping sickness, and in the Sudan the first experiments were only just being made. In 1938 over 300,00o bales of cotton were produced in the Sudan and more than 400,000 bales in Uganda.