Textile manufacturing

Textile manufacturing is a major industry. It is based on the conversion of fibre into yarn, yarn into fabric. These are then dyed or printed, fabricated into clothes. Different types of fiber are used to produce yarn. Cotton remains the most important natural fibre, so is treated in depth. There are many variable processes available at the spinning and fabric-forming stages coupled with the complexities of the finishing and colouration processes to the production of a wide ranges of products. There remains a large industry that uses hand techniques to achieve the same results.

Processing of cotton

Cotton is the world's most important natural fibre. In the year 2007, the global yield was 25 million tons from 35 million hectares cultivated in more than 50 countries.

There are six stages

Cultivating and harvesting

Cotton is grown anywhere with long, hot dry summers with plenty of sunshine and low humidity. Indian cotton, gossypium arboreum, is finer but the staple is only suitable for hand processing. American cotton, gossypium hirsutum, produces the longer staple needed for machine production. Planting is from September to mid November and the crop is harvested between March and June. The cotton bolls are harvested by stripper harvesters and spindle pickers, that remove the entire boll from the plant. The cotton boll is the seed pod of the cotton plant, attached to each of the thousands of seeds are fibres about 2.5 cm long.