Cotton Quality Evaluation

Cotton quality characteristics are increasingly measured by instruments rather than manually. Increased competition in the industry, consumer demand for a wider range of products, and more stringent standards for product use have prompted more intensive fiber quality examination.

Over 92 percent of textile firms surveyed own one or more fiber testing instruments. Ninety percent own instruments for testing fineness and maturity, 70 percent for measuring length and length uniformity, and 60 percent for determining fiber strength.

This report traces the development of cotton quality testing, provides a description of the measurable fiber properties and how they relate to processing performance, and presents the results of a survey of textile mills to determine current use of quality information and the extent of instrument testing for determining cotton quality.