Organic Cotton- the multi talent
von Julia Leifert
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Cotton is a multitalented material. It can be used for woven and knitted textiles, heavy materials, like denim or canvas, or ultra soft fabrics, like satin and voile. It is one oft he oldest and most common natural fiber in the world. Almost one-third of the worldwide fiber production in the textile industry is based on cotton. Hereof 1.1% is organic cotton. Most cotton comes from China, India, the USA, and Pakistan. But also there is an cotton industry in Europe, too. Conventionally cotton production usually exists in huge monoculture fields with genetically modified high performance seeds, which need a lot of artificial fertilizers and pesticides against pests.
We don’t believe in the methods for or health and our environment. So we use for our products only use certified organic cotton from Europe. The certification short form „kbA“ (kontrolliert biologischer Anbau, equal to certified organic growth) means that the plants it self were not treated with artificial fertilizers or synthetic pesticide during the growth on the fields. So the cotton has a very low allergy potential and is very skin friendly. The soil hast o be free of chemicals for at least three years before organic plants can be grown. Because organic cotton is picked by hand there is no need for defoliants, like it is in the convectional cotton production.
The certification makes sure there is no child labor tolerated. Further the workers on the fields work under fair labor conditions and don’t have to work with toxic chemicals.
After picking no chemicals like formaldehyde are allowed during the further processing for organic cotton production.
One big problem of the cotton production is the extreme high need of water fort he plants. This problem exists in the organic growing method too, but it depends a lot on the climate conditions in the growing country and on the growing method.
Conventionally cotton-growing methods usually discover in countries without much rainfall. But huge monoculture fields with genetically modified high performance seeds need a lot more water than the organic growing method. So artificial fertilizers for those only annually usable plants is necessary.