Burkina Faso's Socoma to Produce 36,000 Tons of Cotton in Eastern Region

Burkina Faso’s Societe Cotonniere du Gourma, which harvests cotton in the eastern part ofAfrica’s biggest grower of the fiber, will boost output by 33 percent in the 2010-11 crop season, the company said.

The harvest will reach 36,000 metric tons and a further 60,000 tons in 2011-12, said Ali Compaore, chief executive officer of the company known by its acronym, Socoma.

A “good rainy season” along with better-skilled farmers and use of genetically modified cotton are aiding production, he said in an interview in Ouagadougou, the capital, yesterday. The company has purchased 26,800 tons of cotton from farmers in the season to date, he said.

The company operates in the east of the West African nation and has factories in Fada N’Gourma, Diapaga and Kompienga, near its border with Benin, Compaore said.

France’s Geocoton owns 87 percent of Socomoa with the Union Nationale des Producteurs de Cotton, a Burkinabe growers’ group, controlling the remainder, Compaore said.

Burkina Faso’s production is expected to increase by 55 percent to 500,000 tons in the October-to-April harvest, Celestin Tiendrebeogo, chief executive officer of the state- owned cotton company Sofitex, said in December.

Cotton for May delivery gained for the first day in three, adding 1.2 cents, or 0.6 percent, to $2.0565 per pound by 12:37 p.m. in London.

(Source: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-10/burkina-faso-s-socoma-to-produce-36-000-tons-of-cotton-in-eastern-region.html)