Abstract:
Cotton from the three cotton growing regions of Uganda was characterized
for 13 quality parameters using the High Volume Instrument (HVI). Principal
Component Analysis (PCA), Agglomerative Hierarchical Clustering (AHC)
and k-means clustering were used to model cotton quality parameters.
Using factor analysis, cotton yellowness and short fiber index were found
to account for the highest variability. At 5% significance level, the highest
correlation (0.73) was found between short fiber index and yellowness.
Based on Cotton Outlook’s world classification and USDA Standards, the
cotton under test was deemed of high and uniform quality, falling between
Middling and Good Middling grades. Our suggested classification integrates
all lint quality parameters, unlike the traditional methods that consider
selected parameters.
