Cotton - Looking Back and Looking Forward

Cotton grown with drip - Australia

Despite occasional setbacks, the 2023-24 cotton season was a great success – with a mostly mild summer and some helpful rain events to keep the season pushing along. Growers reported low insect pressure, and despite sporadic hail events, most growers ended the season with high yields.

Drip irrigated crops across New South Wales and Queensland also fared well, with improvements in water- and nitrogen-use efficiency, and some nice bumps in yield.

With a dry profile to kick off planting season, wet-up irrigation used more water than expected in both flood- and drip-irrigated fields – some growers reported an 800mm moisture deficit prior to wetting up. In flood furrow irrigation, this led to poor infiltration, sometimes requiring multiple irrigations to fill the soil profile. In drip irrigated fields, this also meant a longer first irrigation before a full ‘black-out’ of the soil was reached. However, establishment was excellent, and for the remainder of the season, irrigation water use was a little below average.

On the whole, drip irrigation results were good compared to flood-furrow and pivot irrigation, and the average yield benefit was just under 2bales/ha, slightly down from the year before. Overall, crops were very healthy, with large leaf areas to make the most of available sunlight, and impressive retention.

Image:  Drip irrigated cotton near Finley showing off some great solar panels.  

  Image: Retention of drip irrigated cotton was impressive. Location: Whitton  

Now half way through October, cotton planting is well underway in most cotton valleys, and is just around the corner for northern Australia. Dripline has gone in the ground without issue, and flood irrigated fields are in good shape for a successful furrow irrigation year.

For the most part, temperatures are warming up, but isolated cool days are not uncommon in the southern valleys. On the whole, the Bureau of Meteorology is expecting higher than average minimum temperatures, warm days and nights, and above average rainfall across the northern and eastern parts of Australia. This is in line with forecasts earlier in the year that we were heading for another La Nina, although it may only be a weak La Nina event.

Rainfall forecasting indicates that the Ord, Northern Territory, Far North Queensland, and central and southern New South Wales will have good falls through the November to January period, with southern Queensland and Northern New South Wales tracking as normal so far. However, there are reports of scattered storms in Northern NSW already, so these valleys still seem on track for a good season.

Temperature forecasts show warmer than average days across the board, so all the cotton valleys look to have good potential for high yields, provided that hot nights don’t impact retention too much.

According to Rabobank, Australia on the whole is set for another strong year for cotton production, but there are concerns that as the US and Brazil are also set for strong production, supply may outstrip demand, with prices dipping slightly in recent months. As such, higher yield and good management of input costs is paramount to the Australian crop’s success, with our local drip irrigated cotton growers set to maximise their net profit margins.

For more information on drip irrigation options in cotton and broadacre crops get in touch with Katherine Munn, Market Development Manager, Ph: 0407 501 527