Mother Nature Pounds West Texas Cotton

Writer: Tim W. McAlavy, (806) 746-6101

LUBBOCK – Five hundred thousand to 725,000 acres was the Friday the 13th “best guess” estimate of damaged
cotton resulting from violent weather that has wracked West Texas since May 31.

Those estimates were offered by agronomist, entomologists, crop consultants, agribusiness representatives, and
others at a Plains Cotton Growers, Inc., roundtable meeting. Economists with Texas Cooperative Extension
estimate the raw potential economic value of those lost acres between $130 million and $188.5 million.

Texas farmers plant about five million cotton acres each year, stretching from the Rio Grande Valley near
Brownsville to the Texas-New Mexico border in the west, and as far north as some counties near Amarillo. The
20-county area surrounding Lubbock is often know as “the world’s largest cotton patch,” because farmers there
typically plant about 3.2 million acres of upland cotton each year. Approximately ten percent of that acreage,
roughly 320,000 acres, never makes it to harvest due to weather, insects, disease, or other causes.

“The 2003 crop has taken a big hit in West Texas from a combination of rain, hail, and wind since May 30-31. I
have lost count of the number of storms,” said Randy Boman, Texas Cooperative Extension cotton agronomist
based at Lubbock.  “I’m guessing we have about 500,000 acres damaged in the 20 counties surrounding
Lubbock. But I feel like that number is low.”

Boman noted that producers in Floyd, Crosby, Hale, Swisher, Parmer, Castro, Bailey, Cochran, Lamb, Lubbock,
Terry, and Yoakum counties were hardest hit, to date. The toll of damage on other crops, such as corn or wheat,
and equipment (center pivot sprinkler, barns, etc.) is not known at this time.

Patrick Burson, manager of the Texas Boll Weevil Eradication Foundation’s Southern High Plains/Caprock
Eradication Zone, put the number of damaged acres at 700,000 to 725,000 acres, based on foundation field
reports ranging from the northern High Plains south into the Permian Basin.

Farmers on the South Plains begin planting their cotton in early May. Roller coaster daily temperatures greeted
their efforts this year. The high temperature reached 103 degrees in Lubbock on May 18, but topped out at only
60 degrees on May 20. Large temperature swings hamper heat loving crops such as cotton, which must
accumulate thousands of daily heat units to make appreciable yields.

“We are a little behind in heat unit accumulation because of cooler temperatures that have delayed planting and
stunted growth of emerging cotton seedlings,” Boman noted. “The only silver lining I see in the clouds so far is
our soil moisture. The three to eight inches of rain we have received will help the surviving crop, and any crop
that we replant.”

Cotton producers should evaluate their damaged fields closely and carefully before making any replant decisions,
Boman said. There is a host of information on evaluating damaged crops, making replant decisions, and choosing
catch crops to replace failed cotton on the Internet at: http://lubbock.tamu.edu.

With a new farm bill/program under way, producers should check with their county USDA Farm Service
Agency (FSA) office to ensure their replanting decisions will not affect their program participation or program
benefits.
 
“It’s also important for producers to destroy those failed cotton acres, to eliminate any potential habitat for boll
weevils,” noted Stan Carroll, cotton entomologist with the Texas Agricultural Experiment Station. Farmers in
active boll weevil eradication zones pay an assessment to fund eradication of this pest through the Texas Boll
Weevil Eradication Foundation. Those who clean out failed cotton acres may be eligible for a credit on their
assessment, but the possibility of a credit varies zone-by-zone.

“I’m concerned that our recent weather losses could reduce our regional yield potential by as much as one
million bales,” said Roger Haldenby, vice president-operations for Plains Cotton Growers.

“The damage to date has cut the heart out of some of our most productive areas,” Boman added.

To gauge the raw potential product value of lost cotton, Extension economists typically multiply the number of
acres lost or failed by its potential yield per acre, and then multiply that number by the existing federal cotton
loan rate. Using this year’s numbers, that formula would look like this:
Scenario A:  500,000 acres X 500 lbs./acre (one bale) X .52 cents/lb. (loan rate) = $130 million
Scenario B: 725,000 acres X 500 lbs./acre X 52 cents/lb. = $188.5 million

These scenarios do not reflect any crop insurance payments or federal disaster aid payments  affected growers
might receive, nor do they reflect the “ripple” effect these dollars might have in the regional or state economy. If
an economic multiplier of 2.5 is applied, the total projected economic impact could range from $325 million to
$471 million.

Economic multipliers are often used to account for the ripple effect of currency spending as it passes through a
regional or state economy.