Dilys Wang 

The table above lists China's major cotton import sources, ordered by import volume from highest to lowest. Of the 109.8kt of cotton imported by China in Jun, Brazil was still the top supplier with 44.1kt of cotton imported, a year-on-year increase of 38kt, but down by 21kt from May. Australian cotton imports reached 30.6kt, up 24kt year-on-year and 29kt month-on-month. U.S. cotton imports amounted to 17.9kt, a year-on-year increase of 14kt and down by 7kt from May.

In terms of import shares for Jun 2026, Brazilian cotton accounted for 40%, up 19 percentage point from the same period in 2025 but down 18 percentage points from May (58%); Australian cotton made up 28%, up 5 percentage points from 5% a year earlier and up significantly from May; and U.S. cotton represented 16%, up 2 percentage point from May 2025 and down 6 percentage point from 22% in previous month.

For the terms of trade, the share of ordinary trade in Jun was at 19%, up 1 percentage point from May. The combined proportion of entrepot trade by bonded area and customs warehousing trade accounted for stood at 72%, down 1 percentage points from 73% in May. The proportion of processing with imported materials was flat from May to 9%. 

In Jun, enterprises from Shandong, Beijing and Jiangsu ranked top three in cotton imports: Shandong's share reduced by 7 percentage points to 48%. Beijing's share increased 5 percentage points to 15%. Jiangsu's share rose 6 percentage points to 13%.

General condition of China cotton imports:

On the afternoon of Aug 25, 2025, relevant departments issued an announcement on the allocation of the sliding-scale duty quota for imported cotton in 2025. The allocated volume remains at only 200,000 tons, which can only be imported through processing trade and is distributed on the basis of contract applications, with a relatively narrow scope of use. On Mar 16, 2026, China announced to allocate 300kt sliding-scale duty quotas. Coupled with the 894,000 tons of 1% duty quota allocated each year, the known quota for the 2025/26 season has reached 1.394 million tons. The Tariff Commission of the State Council announced on March 4, 2025, that a 15% tariff would be imposed on U.S. cotton. Under the 1% duty quota, the import tax rate for U.S. cotton is: 1% duty + 15% separately imposed additional duty + 10% reciprocal duty. On Nov 5, 2025, the Tariff Policy Commission of the State Council announced that, starting from 13:01 on Nov 10, 2025, it would terminate the additional tariff measures specified in the Announcement of the Tariff Policy Commission of the State Council on Imposing Additional Tariffs on Certain Imports Originating in the United States (Announcement No. 2 of the Tariff Policy Commission, 2025). Specifically, this means the 15% additional tariff on U.S. cotton is lifted; the applicable import tariff rate for U.S. cotton will be a combination of a 1% tariff and a 10% reciprocal duty.

Brazilian cotton remained the top imported variety in China during Jun 2026. In Jun 2026, China imported 44.1kt of Brazilian cotton, down 20.9kt month-on-month and up 38.5kt year on year; in the first half year of 2026, imports amounted to 543kt, an increase of 301kt compared with the same period last year. For the 2025/26 marketing year (Sep-Jun), China imported 751kt of Brazilian cotton, up 306kt from the 445kt recorded in the year-earlier period.

The average unit price of imported cotton is calculated by dividing the total customs value of imported cotton by the total quantity. Among the major imported cotton varieties in Jun, the average price of Brazilian cotton was 75.7cent/lb, and that of Australian cotton was 87.4cent/lb.

Conclusion:

Cotton imports are expected to continue to reduce in July, and Brazilian and Australian cotton will remain the top import variety.