China to buy 1m tons of US cotton

China, the world’s biggest consumer of cotton, is seeking to buy 1 million metric tons of the crop from the US to boost government stockpiles, Bloomberg reported quoting two executives familiar with the matter. Since last week, the organization responsible for Chinese stockpiles has bought 160,000 tons from the US, where the price of cotton is significantly cheaper than in China, the people said. The purchases helped push up cotton futures for the second consecutive week. The USDA projects that imports by China may drop to 13.5 million, 480-pound bales in 2012-2013 from 23.25 million bales a year earlier. “The Chinese government has become the most important factor in global demand and supply,” said Dong Shuangwei, a senior analyst at Beijing Capital Futures Co.