At both the Micro and Macro levels, Cotton assumes social and economic importance as outlined below:

• It provides employment in the country side both at the farm level, ginnery, textile and garment enterprises.
• It generates the needed cash income to people living in the rural areas.
• Prepares seed bed and adds soil nutrients to followon crop such as Millet, Sesame, Groundnuts and Peas.
• Acts as source of raw materials in the production of textiles, edible oils, soap, and seedcake for livestock, among others.

Constraints of the sector
i) Low levels of mechanization coupled with continued use of the hand hoe for land opening.
ii) Land fragmentation
iii) High rate of seed wastage during planting
iv) Inadequate cotton – targeted extension services
v) Low soil fertility especially in Eastern Uganda
vi) Over dependence on rain fed production.
vii) High production costs without accessible andaffordable credit by rural farmers.
viii) Low capacity of Domestic Value Addition resulting in over dependence on the volatile World market prices which determine our farm gate prices (95% of our production is exported).
ix) High utility tariffs for cotton processors
x) Dependence of ginners on pre-financing by merchants which is costly and results in reduced prices to farmers.

Achievements of CDO
1) On spot cash payment to farmers for their crop under liberalized marketing.
2) Establishment of a Ginning Training School at Busitema National College of Agricultural Mechanisation (BNCAM). To-date, over 100 ginning engineers and technicians have graduated at the School and have been fully absorbed in the industry.
3) Improved quality of Ugandan cotton to premium status especially for our international markets.
4) An organized seed distribution system has evolved.
5) Annual production has raisen from 11,000 bales in 1993 to 254,000 bales in 2005.
7) Improved seed varieties with higher yields and better fibre parameters have been developed.
8) Increased ginning capacity from 100,000 bales (1994/95) to 800,000 bales (2004/05)
9) Formation and evolvement of a Private Sector body; the Uganda Ginners and cotton Exporters’ Association (UGCEA)
10) Improvement of seed for planning by removal of fuzz (delinting) and grading using mechanical seed delinting machines.

What CDO continues doing
• Cotton Development Organisation continues to mobilize and encourage farmers to form farmer groups for easier delivery of services and access to credit and collective bargaining at marketing time.

• Despite heavy government investment in the cotton sector, cotton production had stagnated at about 20,000 MT in the past several years. Subsequently ginners did take it upon themselves to support cotton production and productivity. The ginners’ strategy focuses on mainly on;

(i) Registration of cotton farmers (farmers Group Formation) in their areas, thus creating a reliable data bank to ensure that planting seed is only supplied to genuine cotton farmers to curb seed wastage.
(ii) Interpretation of the recommended agronomic practices on cotton into the relevant local languages and use of all available means to disseminate the technologies to the farmers.
(iii) Where possible, assist farmers groups to open up sizeable acreage of land for cotton production and production inputs supply.
(iv) Setting up of demonstration plots for farmers training on appropriate agronomic practices.
(vi) Promotion of increased domestic value addition.
(vii) Advocating for Removal of subsidies by the developed world.