Results from Cotton Incorporated's Natural Resource Survey and Implications for Engineering Research

In 2008, a Natural Resource Survey was conducted of U.S. cotton producers to self-assess cotton’s impact on the environment and to collect data to support a global life cycle assessment project.  In 2015, Cotton Incorporated with support from the entire U.S. cotton industry conducted a similar self-assessment to look at trends since the last evaluation.  A request went out to 12,000 U.S. producers who grew cotton in 2014.  There were 925 total responses from the 17 cotton growing states proportional to the cotton acreage grown each those states.  The responses represented 10% of U.S. cotton acres, with 86% indicating they grew crops other than cotton.  A total of 1.7 million acres of land was managed by the respondents for all crops.  The proposed presentation will focus on the results that are relevant to those conducting agricultural engineering research and education to cotton producers.  Examples of results to be presented include producer identified research priorities, adoption of precision farming technologies and frequency of use of advanced tool for irrigation scheduling.  Some of the results will also be discussed from a life cycle analysis perspective to identify farming practices that have the highest impacts in terms of energy use and environmental emissions and how engineering technologies could reduce these impacts.