Cotton (fibre): production by country
Cotton (fibre): the total weight produced in each country in a year, in tonnes. Which countries produce the most?
#1 China (5.62M t), #2 India (5.53M t), #3 Brazil (2.92M t). The last place is Iraq (0.35 t).
How to read this number
The total weight, in tonnes, of the crop or product harvested or produced in the country in a year, as reported to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). Item: Cotton (fibre). Cotton is counted as ginned cotton lint (the fibre), after the seeds are taken out, not as raw cotton picked from the plant.
Only countries with a production above zero are listed. Countries that grow or make none, or that have no FAO figure, are not ranked (they are not counted as zero). Many figures, especially for small countries, are estimated by the FAO, so small differences between countries are not reliable. Weather and harvests change the amounts from year to year.
- Countries listed: 85 (of 193)
- Data year: 2023
Map
Ranking table
Sorted from the highest value
| Rank | Country | Cotton (fibre): production | Year | Bar |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  China |
5,617,900 t | 2023 | |
| 2 |  India |
5,528,744 t | 2023 | |
| 3 |  Brazil |
2,923,677 t | 2023 | |
| 4 |  United States |
2,627,060 t | 2023 | |
| 5 |  Pakistan |
1,738,839 t | 2023 | |
| 6 |  Australia |
1,252,480 t | 2023 | |
| 7 |  Uzbekistan |
810,644 t | 2023 | |
| 8 |  Türkiye |
777,000 t | 2023 | |
| 9 |  Kazakhstan |
327,734 t | 2023 | |
| 10 |  Greece |
305,000 t | 2023 | |
| 11 |  Argentina |
295,014 t | 2023 | |
| 12 |  Mali |
239,001 t | 2023 | |
| 13 |  Benin |
219,130 t | 2023 | |
| 14 |  Burkina Faso |
214,865 t | 2023 | |
| 15 |  Mexico |
190,000 t | 2023 | |
| 16 |  Cameroon |
178,500 t | 2023 | |
| 17 |  Turkmenistan |
178,083 t | 2023 | |
| 18 |  Myanmar |
153,213 t | 2023 | |
| 19 |  Nigeria |
99,200 t | 2023 | |
| 20 |  Côte d’Ivoire |
97,000 t | 2023 | |
| 21 |  Tajikistan |
96,000 t | 2023 | |
| 22 |  Azerbaijan |
80,545 t | 2023 | |
| 23 |  Egypt |
77,530 t | 2023 | |
| 24 |  Ethiopia |
63,320 t | 2023 | |
| 25 |  Tanzania |
54,000 t | 2023 | |
| 26 |  Chad |
49,000 t | 2023 | |
| 27 |  Sudan |
43,500 t | 2023 | |
| 28 |  Uganda |
41,905 t | 2023 | |
| 29 |  Spain |
40,500 t | 2023 | |
| 30 |  Afghanistan |
40,410 t | 2023 | |
| 31 |  Syria |
32,846 t | 2023 | |
| 32 |  Iran |
31,300 t | 2023 | |
| 33 |  Zimbabwe |
21,837 t | 2023 | |
| 34 |  Bangladesh |
21,100 t | 2023 | |
| 35 |  Kyrgyzstan |
20,946 t | 2023 | |
| 36 |  Central African Republic |
19,986 t | 2023 | |
| 37 |  Togo |
19,322 t | 2023 | |
| 38 |  Zambia |
18,400 t | 2023 | |
| 39 |  South Africa |
16,045 t | 2023 | |
| 40 |  Guinea |
15,959 t | 2023 | |
| 41 |  Israel |
14,040 t | 2023 | |
| 42 |  Mozambique |
12,542 t | 2023 | |
| 43 |  North Korea |
12,000 t | 2023 | |
| 44 |  Colombia |
11,920 t | 2023 | |
| 45 |  Peru |
11,000 t | 2023 | |
| 46 |  Paraguay |
9,424 t | 2023 | |
| 47 |  Democratic Republic of the Congo |
8,752 t | 2023 | |
| 48 |  Ghana |
6,000 t | 2023 | |
| 49 |  Madagascar |
4,801 t | 2023 | |
| 50 |  Senegal |
4,500 t | 2023 | |
| 51 |  Malawi |
4,000 t | 2023 | |
| 52 |  Bolivia |
2,481 t | 2023 | |
| 53 |  Nicaragua |
2,299 t | 2023 | |
| 54 |  Somalia |
2,076 t | 2023 | |
| 55 |  Niger |
1,950 t | 2023 | |
| 56 |  Tunisia |
1,915 t | 2023 | |
| 57 |  Venezuela |
1,740 t | 2023 | |
| 58 |  Yemen |
1,723 t | 2023 | |
| 59 |  Thailand |
1,510 t | 2023 | |
| 60 |  Guinea-Bissau |
1,464 t | 2023 | |
| 61 |  Ecuador |
1,381 t | 2023 | |
| 62 |  Kenya |
1,296 t | 2023 | |
| 63 |  Angola |
1,100 t | 2023 | |
| 64 |  Honduras |
891 t | 2023 | |
| 65 |  Guatemala |
592 t | 2023 | |
| 66 |  Eswatini |
505 t | 2023 | |
| 67 |  Bulgaria |
491 t | 2023 | |
| 68 |  Laos |
345 t | 2023 | |
| 69 |  Burundi |
315 t | 2023 | |
| 70 |  Botswana |
295 t | 2023 | |
| 71 |  Haiti |
284 t | 2023 | |
| 72 |  Costa Rica |
257 t | 2023 | |
| 73 |  Albania |
241 t | 2023 | |
| 74 |  Gambia |
181 t | 2023 | |
| 75 |  Cambodia |
78 t | 2023 | |
| 76 |  Morocco |
67 t | 2023 | |
| 77 |  Nepal |
45 t | 2023 | |
| 78 |  Indonesia |
41 t | 2023 | |
| 79 |  Antigua & Barbuda |
30 t | 2023 | |
| 80 |  Algeria |
28 t | 2023 | |
| 81 |  Philippines |
25 t | 2023 | |
| 82 |  Grenada |
16 t | 2023 | |
| 83 |  Vietnam |
7 t | 2023 | |
| 84 |  St. Kitts & Nevis |
2 t | 2023 | |
| 85 |  Iraq |
0 t | 2023 |
No matching countries.
Each value is the latest year available for that country (see the Year column), so the years can differ from country to country.
Data is available for 85 of 193 countries. The rest are not listed.
Source: FAO. 2025. FAOSTAT: Crops and livestock products. Accessed on 04 November 2026. https://www.fao.org/faostat/en/#data/QCL Licence: CC-BY-4.0. Processed by this site. fao.org/faostat
How it has changed (1961–2023)
See how cotton (fibre) production has changed across the world’s countries from 1961 to 2023.
- The country ranked first was United States (3.11M t) in 1961 and is China (5.62M t) in 2023. In between, the country ranked first changed 13 times. This is the first place among today’s countries: regions that later split, such as the former Soviet Union, have no values from before the split.
| Country | 1961 | 1970 | 1980 | 1990 | 2000 | 2010 | 2020 | 2023 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| China | 800K t | 2.28M t | 2.71M t | 4.51M t | 4.42M t | 5.96M t | 5.91M t | 5.62M t |
| India | 884K t | 954K t | 1.29M t | 1.67M t | 1.64M t | 5.68M t | 6.13M t | 5.53M t |
| Brazil | 423K t | 645K t | 553K t | 634K t | 663K t | 973K t | 2.76M t | 2.92M t |
| United States | 3.11M t | 2.22M t | 2.42M t | 3.38M t | 3.74M t | 3.94M t | 3.18M t | 2.63M t |
| Pakistan | 324K t | 542K t | 715K t | 1.64M t | 1.83M t | 1.95M t | 1.2M t | 1.74M t |
 Japan | – | – | – | – | – | – | – | – |
| Countries with data | 82 | 83 | 82 | 85 | 86 | 85 | 86 | 85 |
Explore next
- The color bar (legend) under the map shows how colors match values. Point at a country to see its number.
- Select a country name in the table to open its page with the capital, population, area and more.
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