For over thirty years, Will Allen has been on the forefront of organic farming and environmental activism in California. Allen is now the co-director of the Sustainable Cotton Project, based in Oroville, California. Over the past three years he has taken hundreds of journalists, business people, farmers and government policy makers on tours of the cotton country.
Visitors see first-hand the destructive toll that industrial cotton farming has on the land.
He is also instrumental in supporting farmers in their struggle to develop organic methods of cultivation and harvesting. Under Allen's supervision, the Sustainable Cotton Project conducts leading-edge research in the field of organic cotton production as well as in accumulating data on the amount of chemicals annually applied to cotton. Farmers interested in experimenting with organic growing techniques can look to his organization for support and guidance. Their farm outreach program was funded by the California Environmental Protection Agency in 1996 to accomplish just that. Researchers and writers looking for statistics and analysis of both the conventional cotton industries should consult some of the Sustainable Cotton Project's many outstanding papers.