The lure of corn for farmers struggling with a weak cotton market may be strong -- and cotton prices are likely to react to any shift. cotton exports plummeted over the past year as China and India boosted their cotton production. has cotton traders on edge ahead of the Agriculture Department's spring plantings report, due out Friday. But the resulting decline in production may not be nearly so pronounced, said Stephen Slinsky, the industry group's senior economist. He expects the USDA to...

In Virginia, cotton acreage is predicted to drop 19 percent and soybean acreage to drop 4 percent from 2006. Then in 2002, a Depression-era system that guaranteed high profits to some peanut farmers was dismantled to put prices on par with the international market. Corn prices are the highest they've been in years, and that has pushed up the amount of money farmers can make for growing other crops, too, Rountree said. A 41 percent increase in acreage is due to profitable contracts. High...

ISLAMABAD: Over-dependence on Cottonomy (cotton economy) and stiff competition with China, India and Bangladesh specifically in higher value-added categories, which have traditionally not been of strength for Pakistani textile sector, is a potential threat to the countrys export growth. ISLAMABAD: Over-dependence on Cottonomy (cotton economy) and stiff competition with China, India and Bangladesh specifically in higher value-added categories, which have traditionally not been of strength...

Commodities markets responded to the larger-than-anticipated corn plantings, with corn prices quickly dropping 20 cents a bushel, hitting the limit and stopping trading for the day, said Mike Woolverton, grain marketing economist at Kansas State University. WICHITA - Driven by demand from the ethanol and cattle feeding industries, Kansas farmers joined growers across the nation in plans to plant the biggest corn crop since 1944, a report released Friday showed. Commodities markets...

Expected corn acreage is up in nearly all states, due to favorable prices fueled by increased demand from ethanol producers as well as strong export sales. Other crops with expected acreage increases are sorghum, up 9 percent, and canola, up 12 percent, and barley, up 7 percent from last year s record low. Department of Agriculture released its annual prospective plantings report March 30, and Mississippi producers are predicted to plant 950,000 acres of corn, compared to 340,000 acres...