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This project aims to build a historical geography of cotton farming in NSW and QLD, with an emphasis on how farmers have adapted cotton-growing to local conditions, and the extent to which they have adopted technological innovations over time.  The project will draw on quantitative and qualitative methodologies to capture the ‘adaptive strategies’ that farming communities use – individually and collectively – in the face of change.  Currently, cotton farming communities are facing increased pressure because of issues of water usage, long dry spells (‘droughts’), fluctuating cotton prices and global economic crises and, most recently, the buy-back of water licenses by the Australian Federal Government.  This research will use a multiple- methods approach (detailed below) to generate a broad-based database of farmer knowledges (statistics); it will also use ethnographic methodologies to provide detailed case-studies of adaptability and adaptive strategies to change (exemplars of practice).  As well as farmers, local townsfolk, who have had long-term involvement in cotton communities, will be approached to add their perspectives (and memorabilia).  The project will provide the basis of (a) publication(s) and/or documentary DVD on the historical geography, and current best practices (as appropriate), which will be handed back to cotton communities for current and future generations.