Cotton is the basic natural fiber of the Nation. It is produced by many individual cottongrowers throughout the various cotton-producing States of the Nation and also outside the United States. Cotton moves in the channels of interstate and foreign commerce and such cotton which does not move in such channels directly burdens or affects interstate commerce in cotton and cotton products. The efficient production of cotton and the maintenance and expansion of existing markets and the development of new or improved markets and uses is vital to the welfare of cottongrowers and those concerned with marketing, using, and processing cotton as well as the general economy of the Nation. The great inroads on the market and uses for cotton which have been made by manmade fibers have been largely the result of extensive research and promotion which have not been effectively matched by cotton research and promotion. The production and marketing of cotton by numerous individual farmers have prevented the development and carrying out of adequate and coordinated programs of research and promotion necessary to the maintenance and improvement of the competitive position of, and markets for, cotton. Without an effective and coordinated method for assuring cooperative and collective action in providing for, and financing such programs, individual cotton farmers are unable adequately to provide or obtain the research and promotion necessary to maintain and improve markets for cotton.

It has long been found to be in the public interest to have, or endeavor to have, a reasonable balance between the supply of and demand for cotton grown in this country. To serve this public interest the Congress has provided for the comprehensive exercise of regulatory authority in regulating the handling of such cotton supplemented by price-support programs with the objective of adjusting supply to demand in the interest of benefiting producers and all others concerned with the production and handling of cotton as well as the general economy of the country. In order for the objective of such programs to be effectuated to the fullest degree, it is necessary that the existing regulation of marketing be supplemented by providing as part of the overall governmental program for effectuating this objective, means of increasing the demand for cotton with the view of eventually reducing or eliminating the need for limiting marketings and supporting the price of cotton.

It is therefore declared to be the policy of the Congress and the purpose of this chapter that it is essential in the public interest through the exercise of the powers provided herein, to authorize and enable the establishment of an orderly procedure for the development, financing through adequate assessments on all cotton marketed in the United States and on imports of cotton, and carrying out an effective and continuous coordinated program of research and promotion designed to strengthen cotton’s competitive position and to maintain and expand domestic and foreign markets and uses for United States cotton.