plate 258 · 2025/26 data

Pakistan now imports about as much cotton as it grows

Pakistan's cotton production vs imports, million 480-lb bales, marketing years 2014/15 and 2025/26. USDA.

Who feeds the world
  1. 1. Brazil has all but caught the US in farm exports
  2. 2. Brazil exports more chicken than the US and EU combined
  3. 3. India now ships over a third of world rice exports
  4. 4. Russia now exports twice as much wheat as the US
  5. 5. Egypt exports more fresh oranges than any other country
  6. 6. China buys three in ten of the world's beef imports
  7. 7. Farmed seafood now outweighs the wild catch
  8. 8. Spanish olive oil mill prices are back at 2021 levels
  9. 9. Ukraine sells a fifth less grain than before the war
  10. 10. Brazil overtook the US as the world's top cotton exporter
  11. 11. Laos now mines more potash than Israel or Jordan
  12. 12. India now grows more rice than China
  13. 13. Côte d'Ivoire grows more cashews than India
  14. 14. Indonesia set to use more palm oil than it exports
  15. 15. Mato Grosso grows more soy than China and India combined
  16. 16. Africa now has more hungry people than Asia
  17. 17. Vietnam now drinks more coffee than Russia
  18. 18. Nigeria now eats more rice than Japan
  19. 19. Ecuador is now the world's second-biggest cocoa bean exporter
  20. 20. Mexico, home of maize, imports more of it than anyone
  21. 21. Cuba now imports more raw sugar than it exports
  22. 22. Japan's fish catch fell to a quarter of its peak
  23. 23. Chicken gives Egyptians twice the calories beef does
  24. 24. Brazil overtook the US as the world's top beef producer
  25. 25. Sub-Saharan Africa doubled its grain, mostly by farming more land
  26. 26. Pakistan now imports about as much cotton as it grows
83%

Pakistan's cotton imports as a share of its own crop in 2025/26, up from 9% in 2014/15.

Half

The 2025/26 crop of 5.3 million bales was half the 2014/15 crop; in 2022/23 and 2024/25 imports topped the harvest.

4.6×

Imports rose from 0.95 to 4.4 million bales, about 44% of the cotton Pakistan's mills used in 2025/26.

Source: USDA Foreign Agricultural Service, Cotton: World Markets and Trade, 2025/26
the numbers & method
Pakistan now imports about as much cotton as it grows. Source: USDA Foreign Agricultural Service, Cotton: World Markets and Trade, 2025/26.
2014/15 (M)2025/26 (M)
Cotton grown10.605.30
Cotton imported0.954.40

Claim types Fact · Estimate

USDA FAS, Cotton: World Markets and Trade, Table 02 (production, imports, domestic use by country), thousand 480-lb bales, marketing years August–July. October 2026 edition: Pakistan production 2022/23 3,900; 2023/24 7,000; 2024/25 5,000; 2025/26 5,300. Imports 4,500; 3,200; 6,100; 4,400. 2026/27 values (production 5,000, imports 5,100) are USDA projections and are not shown. 2012/13–2015/16 from the September 2016 edition of the same circular (esmis.nal.usda.gov): production 9,300; 9,500; 10,600; 7,000; imports 1,800; 1,200; 950; 3,300. The 2014/15 values are from that older edition, not the current database. Shares and ratios are progrss calculations: imports ÷ production 9.0% (2014/15) and 83.0% (2025/26); imports 4.6 times higher. USDA estimates are based on official and trade sources; USDA's GAIN report PK2025-0002 notes that Pakistan's cotton production is widely seen as under-reported. Domestic use was 9,900 thousand bales in 2025/26, so imports equalled about 44% of it (progrss calculation). The cause of the fall (pests, heat, floods, crop switching) is not measured here.

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