South African retailer Woolworths wants more organic cotton

South African supermarket chain Woolworths has set a target for the establishment of local organic cotton farmers by 2010 as part of its plan to drive up its 100 percent organic cotton clothing sales.

Emil Grey, a company technical manager, said that at present there were no organic cotton farmers in South Africa and that most supplies were sourced from India. He said local farmers needed to be convinced that organic cotton farming was viable. Another challenge was that many farmers were attracted to maize because of high prices at the moment. But he said trials were going on and the retailer would meet local farmers.

In general, yields on organic cotton are lower, though it can command higher prices. It can take up to three years for soil on which pesticides were previously used to attain organic certification.

Uganda and Tanzania both have organic cotton farming and ginning sectors, but the countries are hampered by a lack of other downstream processes, such as spinning and textile making.

Grey said Woolworths' 100 percent cotton sales were expected to be R30 million ($4 million) in the year to this month, but that the target was R400 million ($56 million) by 2012. Sales, including 5 percent organic cotton content clothing, were expected to be R300 million ($42 million) and the aim in five years was to breach the R1 billion ($140 million) mark.

Players in the supply chain at an Organic Exchange conference called on Woolworths to give them more precise information regarding its organic vision so they could plan ahead.

Jonathan Blunt of textile mill chemicals supplier Rudolf Chemicals said Woolworths needed to inform suppliers which organic standard it was going to select as changes needed to be made to make supply lines comply. Blunt said some mills would need to convert to organic systems as it was not efficient to run two systems.

He said that the EU environmental standard certification, known as Oketex, cost as much as euro 15,000 a chemical. Marks & Spencer sustainable development manager Katie Stafford said organic cotton sales at the UK retailer had hit the £100 million level, 10 percent of its cotton sales.

Stafford said role players, including retailers, needed to help build sustainable cotton farming businesses in developing countries as opposed to simply being aid donors. She said small-scale farmers needed to be given fair prices and viewing organic as a short-term fashion trend would not build a sustainable livelihood for farmers.

Business Report