Cotton futures advanced to a record for the fifth straight session on concern that a decline in production in China will prompt the world’s biggest user to boost imports and drain global inventories.

China’s harvest may fall 5 percent in the year that began Sept. 1 because of natural disasters in producing regions such as Xinjiang and Changjiang, Caijing Online said on Nov. 6, citing an official with the Rural Economy Department at the National Development and Reform Commission. Output was 6.4 million metric tons last year, down 15 percent, an industry group said on Sept. 27.

“It looks like China is going to keep buying,” said Sid Love, the president of Joe Kropf & Sid Love Consulting Services LLC in Overland Park, Kansas. “There is an absence of sellers.”

Cotton for December delivery rose by the exchange limit of 4 cents, or 2.8 percent, to settle at a record $1.4623 a pound at 2:25 p.m. on ICE Futures U.S. in New York. Last week, the commodity gained 14 percent, the most since November 2008.

The price has surged 93 percent this year, the most among 19 raw materials in the Thomson Reuters/Jefferies CRB Index.

“It’s not just a story about supply and demand, but investment demand as well,” said Ker Chung Yang, an analyst at Phillip Futures Pte. in Singapore.

Stockpiles in the U.S., the largest exporter, may fall to 2.56 million bales by July 31, from 2.95 million a year earlier, as exports rise, according to the average estimate of 10 analysts surveyed by Bloomberg News last week. On Oct. 8, the U.S. Department of Agriculture forecast an inventory of f2.7 million bales. The USDA will update its projections for U.S. and global supplies at 8:30 a.m. tomorrow in Washington.

U.S. exports may reach 15.7 million bales, more than the 15.5 million bales estimated by the USDA last month, the survey showed. A bale weighs 480 pounds, or 228 kilograms.

“The USDA numbers will be keenly watched,” Love said.