VALUES PLACED ON US COTTON-FIBER ATTRIBUTES BY TEXTILE MANUFACTURERS

Price premiums and discounts paid for cotton quality attributes (trash , color, length, strength, and micronaire) by textile manufacturers we re derived for three US cotton production regions. The data for the an alysis were individual contracts of textile firm purchases representin g about 26% of US cotton production and 41% of the cotton used by mill s over the 1992-early 1995 period, All fiber attributes except strengt h significantly affected prices paid by mills for cotton from the West ern, South Central, and Southern production regions. Price premiums an d discounts for all fiber attributes differed between Western and Sout h Central cottons. Region differences in price premiums and discounts between the West and South were found for length and micronaire, but l ittle difference was found between the Southern and South Central regi ons for any fiber attribute except micronaire. The information obtaine d from the study provides better understanding of cotton pricing struc tures relative to quality attributes in the textile mill market.