China textile exports to US up 41pc
US imports of textiles and apparel from China shot up about 41 per cent in January from December and were nearly 30 per cent above a year earlier, US Commerce Department data showed.
In a special report, the department said the value of textile and apparel imports from China hit $1.89 billion in January. Previous department figures show comparable imports of about $1.34 billion in December. Textile groups in the United States and European Union are worried about a surge in textile imports from China following the end of a decades-old international quota system on January 1.
Alumina capacity
Aluminum Corp of China aims to double capacity for making alumina at its flagship Pingguo plant to 1.65 million tonnes within the next four years.
Pingguo, earmarked as the site for a long-awaited 50-50 joint venture between Chalco and US-based Alcoa, the world’s top alumina producer, would start building 800,000 tonnes of new capacity in the second half of this year, an official said.
The official said the planned expansion required final approval from the State Council, China’s policy-making body, but the executive added: “It shouldn’t have any problems.”
German orders fall
German factory orders were down in January, largely in a corrective move to a record-breaking surge seen the previous month. But the upward trend in Germany’s manufacturing sector still appears to be intact, analysts said.
The Economics and Labour Ministry calculated that German manufacturing orders fell by 3.4 per cent in January from December. However, the decline was not enough to offset a 7.6-percent jump in orders seen the previous month, driven by an unusually large number of big-ticket orders, it said.
Chip sales rise
Global sales of microchip-making equipment rose 19.4 per cent in January from a year earlier to $3.14 billion, up for the 18th straight month, an industry group said. But the growth was the smallest since chip equipment sales gained 1.6 percent year-on-year in October 2003, a spokeswoman for the Semiconductor Equipment Association of Japan (SEAJ) said.
