What does Ginning mean?

The process of removing the seeds from the cotton.

Heddels explains Ginning

Ginning is the process of removing the seeds and debris from cotton. The term comes from the cotton gin, invented by Eli Whitney in 1794. In modern ginning, the cotton is first dried to remove moisture, then cleaned to remove any burs, stems, leaves, or other foreign matter. A series of rotating saws with teeth then remove the fibers from the seeds. Afterwards, the cotton fibers are compressed into 500-pound bales to be sent to textiles mills.

Additional Resources

Here is the industrial process of ginning: