Yuan Loong 17 – Esquel Group’s fifth new Sea Island cotton variety

After four years of pre-trial, district trial, and production test, Esquel Group's another new self-bred Sea Island cotton (commercially called Extra-Long-Staple or ELS cotton) variety stood out among a few competing varieties and was named “Yuan Loong 17” on January 23, 2019. “Yuan Loong 17” has been authorized and publicized by the 10th Main Crop Variety Assessment Committee of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region.

The breeding and validation of Yuan Loong 17 lasted for 11 years, which was the result of the unremitting efforts of the cotton breeding team from Esquel's R&D Group. The new ELS variety is characterized by high quality, easy to pick, high resistance to disease, strong adaptability to climate and environment, and high yield with proven yield stability.

According to the decision of the Main Crop Variety Assessment Committee, the new varieties will be named according to the declaration of each organization and will no longer be named as Xinhai or Xinlu series since 2019. Yuan Loong 17 is also the first approved ELS variety named after the Yuan Loong series of our Group.

So far, our company has bred 5 varieties of sea-island cotton (Xinhai 33, Xinhai 50, Xinhai 55, Xinhai 63, and Yuanlong 17), which has not only made positive contributions of promoting Xinjiang ELS cotton’s research and farming, but also laid a solid foundation for our Group to develop premium yarn, fabric, and garment products to enhance the competitiveness of core business.