The cotton plant is a shrub.  The fiber we know as cotton grows around the seeds of the cotton plant.  Cotton is grown as a fiber, feed, and food crop.

Cotton is valued for it's appearance, comfort, and performance.  It is used in a wide variety of products including:  Apparel, towels, sheets, yarn used in knitting and crocheting, bookbinding, even coffee filters.  It is often blended with other fibers like rayon, and synthetic fibers like polyester.

The cottonseed is crushed into oil, meal, and hulls.  The oil is used for cooking and salad oil, as well as in chips, cookies, and crackers. The meal and hulls are used for livestock and poultry feed, as well as fertilizer.

China is the largest producer of cotton, while the U.S. is the largest exporter.  In the United States there are approximately 35,000 farms producing cotton, with the state of Texas growing the most cotton in the U.S..

Cotton is the most widely used natural fiber in the clothing industry today.