Australian cotton is viewed worldwide as a quality fibre and generally performs as expected. A two part study involving a survey of spinning mills that use Australian cotton and an investigation to demonstrate the effects that lint cleaning in gins can have on fibre quality, and yarn and fabric quality, has been conducted. The mill survey found that high nep and short fibre content in Australian cotton and the high micronaire values of the last few years were of particular concern to the spinning companies. The ginning and textile processing trial demonstrated that reducing the number of lint cleaners and controlling moisture during ginning while not removing all the trash was less damaging to the fibre. Further the textile processing trials demonstrated that the textile mill can adequately cope with the higher trash content with no detrimental effects on processing performance, yarn or fabric quality. Indeed there are indications that yarn and fabric properties were improved with this approach.