I just love these pictures from the Cotton Council International 50 year reception. They did this in Washington, DC at Union Station. What I like is the little “cotton tree” that frame the speakers like Hunter Moorhead here.

CCI President David Burns, a North Carolina producer, said that at CCI’s inception in 1956, the industry was in crisis: stocks were the highest in recent memory, man-made fibers were on the move and exports were the lowest they had been in a decade. That year U.S. cotton exporters shipped a total of only 2.2 million bales. “By comparison, today’s global mill demand for cotton is more than four times greater than in 1956,” Burns said. “For the 2005-2006 marketing year, the U.S. is projected to export nearly 17 million bales, which translates to more than a seven-fold increase in exports compared with 1956 and represents around seventy percent of current U.S. production.”

Keynote speakers at the event included: The Honorable Thad Cochran, Chairman, Committee on Appropriations, United States Senate; and Hunter H. Moorhead, Special Assistant to the President for Agriculture, Trade and Food Assistance.