Woods Eastland is chairman of the National Cotton Council. He was elected to the organization's top leadership post at the Council's annual meeting in January 2005 after serving as Council vice chairman in 2004.
Woods is president and chief executive officer of Staplcotn Cooperative Association and Staplcotn Discount Corporation, which are headquartered in Greenwood, Mississippi. Staplcotn, founded in 1921, is America's oldest farmer-owned cotton marketing cooperative, and does business in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, and Tennessee.
Before being named president of Staplcotn in 1986, Woods was elected as a director of Staplcotn in 1977 and served as board chairman from 1981 until 1986. He practiced law with the Jackson, Mississippi, firm of Brunini, Grantham, Grower and Hewes, and was a faculty member of the Jackson School of Law from 1972 until 1974.
Woods has been a cotton, soybean, and rice producer in Sunflower County, MS, since 1974. He also serves as vice president and director of AMCOT, and is a director of the Delta Council and The Seam, LLC. He is past president and chairman of the Cotton Council International, past member of the Board of Managers of the New York Cotton Exchange, a past director of the Memphis Branch Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, and former member of the Board of Governors of the New York Board of Trade.
A native of Doddsville, MS, Woods Eastland holds a B.A. Degree from Vanderbilt University, and a J.D. Degree from the University of Mississippi School of Law. He is a licensed lay reader in the Episcopal Diocese of Mississippi. He and his wife, Lynn, have two children and one grandchild.