Refashioning Cotton the Organic Way - A CRC Story

Cotton is perceived as ‘the fabric of our lives’. We come in contact with cotton-made material in our daily lives. CRC took yet another step in the right direction and turned attention to promoting, developing and marketing organic cotton made products – one of the first of its kind in the hand-woven product arena in Fair Trade! Growing conventional cotton means guzzling pesticides with enormous environmental degradation impact. In tune with environmental ethics, CRC turned a new leaf in the reformation book by opting for organic.

Organic cotton was solely the bastion of big textile houses producing in mass scale. Back in early 90's, a pioneer Swiss company and an Indian spinning mill encouraged organic cotton growing in Madhya Pradesh, India. It was a non-commercial, experimental motive to begin with, but has now grown into a large enterprise. The Indian subsidiary of the Swiss firm is now one of the most sought after organic cotton producing companies.

The organic cotton growing bio-dynamic calendar based on astronomical positions sets the ball rolling. Accordingly, farmers derive the appropriate timing for conjuring up an organic manure base. Once soil is organically treated, seed is sowed. Various stages of Cow Pat Pit (CPP) farming and soil treatment with bio fertilizers like cow dung, vermiwash (tonic collected after vermi-composting), egg shells, jeev amrit, matka khaad, buttermilk, and many other naturally produced agents, are used for agricultural growth augmentation. A casual stroll through organic cotton fields reveals several varieties of organic cotton like short staple, medium staple and long staple. Every field is bordered with a plantation of pigeon pea as a border crop. It takes a minimum of 3 years for a conventional cotton field to go organic.

CRC started buying organic cotton yarn from this certified organic cotton producer (Approved by the Organic Trade Association) and distributes the yarn to its weaving partners. At the same time, CRC developed a range of products woven by these partners, such as Ikkat table cloths, Ikkat yardage, and Ikkat baby carry-cloths, scarves, and fabrics for making shopping bags etc.

CRC has also embarked on the journey of natural dyes with local partners. Only plant extracts are used and petrochemical dyes are bid adieu when it comes to coloring organic cotton fabric. Thus, CRC organic cotton products are non-allergenic and do not contain septic chemicals or bad transpiration. In due course, CRC aims at adding more products to the organic cotton inventory and fulfilling the ambivalent aim of generating a source of income for producers and offering a healthier way of life to purchasers.

• Why Organic? Less than 3% of the world’s arable land is planted with cotton. 
• 24% of the world's insecticides and 10% of the world's pesticides are used for cotton cultivation. 
• Pests build up resistance to chemicals, farmer borrows money to buy more chemicals than before, farmer gets less profit from crop, this repeats until the farmer is destitute. 
• 1 acre of organic cotton instead of an acre of conventional cotton reduces CO^2 release by two tonnes a year.

Dolan Chatterjee 

Projects and Policy - CRC India