Brazil farmers bet on environmentally friendly cotton

After increasing exports 15-fold in the past two decades, Brazil is now the world's second-biggest cotton supplier, after the United States -- and the biggest producer of sustainable cotton.

No less than 84 percent of the cotton grown in the South American agricultural giant is certified by the Better Cotton Initiative (BCI), an international non-profit group to promote sustainable cotton farming.

"Consumers have changed.

People don't want to buy products any more than they don't respect nature and its cycles," says entomologist Cristina Schetino of the University of Brasilia, who specializes in cotton farming.

The industry is trying to improve the international image of Brazilian farming, tarnished by a history of slave labor, heavy pesticide use and the destruction of the Amazon rainforest for agriculture, a trend that has accelerated under far-right President Jair Bolsonaro -- an agribusiness ally.

A new tracing program launched with Brazilian clothing brands meanwhile lets consumers check how cotton goods were produced.

Last season, cotton farmers in Brazil replaced 34 percent of chemical pesticides with biological ones, Abrapa says.

They have also started using drones to apply pesticides more efficiently.

In 2005, the Brazilian Cotton Producers' Association (Abrapa) launched a sustainability training program for farmers and introduced protocols on efficiently using water and pesticides and phasing out toxic products in favor of biological fertilizers.