The National Cotton Council has announced the schedule for the 2017 Beltwide Cotton Conferences. This year’s “Beltwide” will provide nearly three days of meetings aimed at helping attendees improve production, processing and marketing efficiency.

Set for Jan. 4-6 at the Hyatt Regency Dallas Hotel in Dallas, Texas, the conferences offer farmers, consultants, researchers, Extension and industry members in a long list of events that will provide insight into the latest available tools and research findings. To register, visit the BWCC website at www.cotton.org/beltwide/.

The 2017 Beltwide will begin at noon on Jan. 4 with the half-day Cotton Consultants Conference –open to all attendees. That Conference will focus on topics of interest selected by a panel of consultants. Among presentations scheduled thus far are:

The Consultants’ Conference also will feature the “New Developments from Industry” session that includes reports on new varieties, chemistries, equipment and other emerging technologies.

The BWCC cotton technical conferences, which will provide updates on research and a look into the technology pipeline, will meet concurrently beginning on the morning of January 5 and conclude by noon on January 6.

Insect updates

Among the information that can be gleaned from those sessions will be entomologists’ updates on the latest research with regard to several classes of insecticides and reports on successful weed management strategies.

For example, the Weed Science Research Conference will include a presentation on achieving crop safety and weed control using varieties resistant to auxin herbicides.

For 2017, the cotton agronomy, physiology, and soil technical conferences will be combined into one conference with multiple sessions. Some topics being considered for this conference are a highly comprehensive simulation model of cotton physiology, nitrogen management for subsurface drip-irrigated cotton and quality/yield evaluation trials across the Cotton Belt.

The Ginning Conference will include several presentations critical to efficient processing and marketing such as module averaging and lint contamination prevention, specifically the challenge presented by various plastic contaminants in seed cotton. This conference will include a panel discussion on the issues associated with ginning cotton varieties with small seed size.

Beginning on the afternoon of January 4, the National Cotton Ginners’ Association will hold several committee and subcommittee meetings. A schedule of those meetings is at http://www.cotton.org/ncga/index.cfm.

Poster sessions

In addition to the multitude of oral presentations, most of the technical conferences and the Consultants Conference will feature poster sessions that also include results from studies conducted by world-class researchers.

Registration costs before December 16 for the NCC-coordinated forum are: $200 for NCC/Cotton Foundation members, university and USDA researchers, Extension personnel, associations and consultants; $400 for non-NCC/Foundation members; and $80 for students. On-site conference self-registration kiosks will be available 24 hours a day beginning on the evening of Jan. 3. Starting on the morning of Jan. 4, NCC staff will be available for attendees needing assistance with registration and name badge printing.

The Beltwide Cotton Conferences annually brings together those with a stake in a healthy U.S. cotton production sector, among them university and USDA researchers, Extension personnel/agents, consultants, and industry sales/support personnel.

That site also includes the preliminary online program and general information about the BWCC. For more information, again, visit www.cotton.org/beltwide/.