Imports may fall to 2.8 million metric tons in the marketing year through August, as output is forecast to rise 25 percent to 7.1 million tons, Shi Jianwei, vice chairman of the China Cotton Association, said today in an interview at a conference in Urumqi, capital of northwestern Xinjiang Province.

Slowing imports by China in the final quarter of 2006 and the first quarter of 2007 weighed on New York cotton futures, which reached a low for the year of 46.85 cents a pound on May 14. Still, prices have risen 31 percent since then, as traders expected shipments to China to increase in the second half.

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"About 400,000 tons a month for the next few months will be the upper limit," Ray Butler, managing director at UK-based researcher Cotlook Ltd, told Bloomberg at the conference.

China, which buys cotton mostly from the US, imported 1.5 million tons in the nine months ended May 31, according to customs data. Imports from June to August would need to be 1.3 million tons to reach Shi's forecast for the year.

The final Chinese output figure for the year through August may reach 7.5 million tons, much higher than the 6.7 million tons reported by the National Bureau of Statistics, Shi said.

For the following year, it could drop to 6.1 million tons, as the weather may not be so good, while demand may remain the same as this year because growth of China's textile production is slowing, he said.

"There is no sign" that current domestic cotton demand is outstripping supply, he added.

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