By George Mwangi

Special to Dow Jones Newswires

The U.S. Agriculture department late Friday increased its forecast for Egypt's cotton production due to a bigger harvest area.

The department now expects production during the marketing year beginning August 2022 through September 2023 to increase to 420,000 480-pound bales compared with its previous forecast of 320,000 bales, it said in its June World Agricultural Production report.

Production in 2022-23 is expected to increase by 50% compared with the current year, the report said.

The harvested area is estimated at 130,000 hectares, up 30% compared with its April forecast and 53% from the previous year, it said.

The planting area has been increasing from a near-record low of 65,000 hectares in 2020-21, the department said, citing Egypt's Cotton Arbitration and Testing General Organization.

In recent years, the Egyptian government has taken control of cottonseed supplies to enhance the Egyptian cotton brand, after the quality had declined due to farmers reusing seeds, it said.

The Egyptian government plans to set up the world's largest spinning and weaving factory in Mahalla al-Kubra, at a cost of about 900 million Egyptian pounds ($48.1 million), according to the U.S. report.