Cotton, once even hailed as "white gold," is rapidly declining in value.

In colonized countries, cotton, which is in high demand and generates enormous wealth, has been forcibly and intensively produced by the policies of Western powers. This long history (monoculture economy) continues to influence the present.

Many former colonial countries that had been forced to grow cotton exclusively, after sacrificing much to achieve independence, began efforts to develop a variety of industries other than cotton.

However, many countries had to rely on cotton, an export product that had been around since colonial times, to obtain the necessary funds to start new industries. There was no other concrete and realistic way to develop new industries.

(Of course there are ways to make other products. But as it turns out, they do not work well. As far as primary commodities go, the structure is very similar to cotton. Other than that, there are often too many complicated and diverse factors to explain, such as trade quota systems and subsidy systems in different countries. (For the sake of clarity, I'll spare you from that in this post.)

The path chosen by cotton farmers was to increase the productivity of the area per unit of cotton.

The entire family, from the elderly who can still move to young children who have begun to walk, work from dawn to dusk in the cotton fields to produce cotton.

However, the "large-scale, industrial, scientific" production of cotton promoted by the industrialized U.S. pushed the price of cotton on the international market downward and downward.

No matter how low the international market price of cotton falls, U.S. cotton farmers will not be troubled. This is because the U.S. government heavily subsidizes and protects its own domestic cotton farmers.

Many Indian farmers remained in the cotton fields to make a living even as the selling price of cotton became lower.

It was during the "Green Revolution" of the 1940s to 1960s that pesticides were brought in under the slogan "The only way out of poverty is to increase the cotton yield per unit area."

Poor Indian farmers borrowed money to buy pesticides, insecticides, and chemical fertilizers to spray their fields. It is not banks but loan sharks that the poor, who have no credit, can borrow from. Interest rates on loans are typically over 30% per annum. It is compound interest, not simple interest. Within a few years, the total amount of interest quickly exceeded the principal amount for many farmers. The vicious cycle is ongoing.

In India, authorities report that a farmer commits suicide approximately every 30 seconds. Most of them are cotton farmers. This number has increased markedly in the last year.

This is part of the reality of India, the second largest cotton-producing country in the world, the land where cotton originated and where Alexander the Great marveled at its softness and beauty during his expedition.