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Can we live without Cotton?

Posted by Douglas Gray on 18th Oct 2016

Can we live without Cotton? At the same standard of living and level of convenience the only answer is no way. Cotton has been used by mankind for over 9,000 years that is known and probably before that time. It is a part of everyone’s daily life who wears clothing, bathes and dries themselves off or has bandages needed to be on them. 

Cotton Dress

To date there is nothing man made or natural that is as soft as cotton for something to wear or as absorbent. The man made synthetic materials are just that, they feel synthetic and not comfortable to wear. While it would be possible to live without cotton in our lives, why would you want to?


Cotton only takes up about 2% of the arable land that plants can grow on, and that small amount of land is not enough to change the level of food dramatically to help meet the ever increasing demand. The comfort level and amount cotton can absorb, especially as comfortable Tees or Pants and used to blend the socks on our feet are necessary for society. Without this material, walking would be more uncomfortable. 


When a survey was conducted on Americans for just what they could not live without, cotton listed third only behind a Swiss army knife and the mobile phone. This places cotton above laptops, toothbrushes and even the all important pen for writing and communicating. It is the all wondrous cotton that is integrated into almost every aspect of our lives today. We wear it. We clean ourselves up with cotton in a blended paper and we wrap ourselves in it at night. 


There is cotton in a lot of the items we use everyday including the printed money we use on a daily basis. Yes most people today do use plastic, but without printed money, all the value will be in computers. That is just not realistic. It is the cotton in the paper bills that make it pliable and long lasting. 


If cotton production ended today it would impact the world’s economy. Several millions of people around the world are involved in it planting, harvesting, milling and manufacturing into textiles along with the sales of these items. 


The feel of cotton clothing is the first thing most people realize in the morning when they wake up in their beds. Would you like to live in a world where everyone woke up uncomfortable and angry because they were scratching themselves all night and did not get a good night’s rest? That is not a world I would like to live in.


It is true the human race would still be in existence if cotton was not available or even if it did not exist. But like all things we get used to, the all important cotton ball is one of the comforts all humans can agree on they would not like to live without.