Many diverse economic and societal pressures are stimulating a re-evaluation of today's agriculture. Growers across the cotton belt are facing intense economic pressures as prices for their products hold steady while costs of production increase. Growers and the general public are becoming increasingly concerned with environmental effects associated with crop production, particularly fertilizers and pesticides as they relate to food safety, pesticide resistance, surface and ground water, and environmental pollution. Breeding for resistance offers the most effective method to control plant pathogens (17, 21). Highly resistant cultivars to the bacterial blight pathogen and cultivars resistant to seed-seedling pathogens have been developed and are currently being grown in the USA and other cotton production regions of the world.