Cotton-growing has been practised for some centuries in Japan, but it was not until the seventeenth century that anything like progress could be reported. From that time to the present the growth has been gradually on the increase.
Japan proper consists of the Islands of Niphon, Kiusiu, Shikoku, Yesso, and an immense number of smaller islands. Cotton cultivation is carried on mainly on the first three islands named, and in the following districts:—San Indo, Wakayama, Osaka, Kuantoebene, Hitachi and Suo.
Taken as a whole, the cotton grown in the best areas is good, though much of an inferior kind is produced. The most southerly area of Wakayama in Niphon yields the best cotton of Japan.
The length of the fibre generally is much less than the herbaceous kind. About 10 per cent. of the entire arable land is now under cultivation for cotton. As a rule, methods and processes are of a primitive kind.
Cotton-growing in Corea.—Lying directly to the west of Japan, this vast peninsula has of late years been developing its cotton-growing. Five centuries ago cotton was imported from China, and one sees on every hand the influence of the Celestials. The cultivated plant is of the perennial type, though it is planted annually, the old plants being dug up and burned, the ash being used as a fertiliser. Statistics at present are not to be relied upon, though it is supposed that something like three quarters of a million acres are now under cultivation, giving on the average about 250 pounds of cotton lint. As in the case of Japan very little of this is exported, all of it or nearly so being spun and woven at home on the most primitive of machines.
The chief districts engaged in growing cotton, nearly all of which lie in the southern portion of the peninsula, are Hwang-Hi, Kyeng-Sang, Chel-La, Kyeng Kwi, and Chung Cheog.
Cotton-growing in China.—Owing to the great difficulty of obtaining any reliable statistical information, it is impossible to give anything approaching accuracy as to number of pounds of cotton produced annually, or number of acres devoted to the cultivation of the Cotton plant. This much, however, is known, that for many centuries cotton cultivating has been followed and that there has been within recent years a great increase in the weight of the cotton crop as well as in the acreage. The type of plant most generally cultivated is the herbaceous, and the cotton resulting is only poor in quality. Little or no preparation is made before sowing seed, which is generally done broadcast. As a result there is much overcrowding, and as is inevitable, there is produced a stubby plant with small bolls and much unripe cotton. On the terraces of the hillsides something approaching cultivation is pursued, with the result of a better crop.
Usually twenty weeks intervene between planting and picking, this latter operation being mostly the work of children and women. The old cotton stalks are afterward collected and dried for fuel.
Very few large plantations exist in China, most of them being only a few acres in extent.
But little of the cotton grown at home is exported, most of it being spun and woven by women, though some of the fibre is sent to Japan.