EIJING (Commodity Online) : China's General Administration of Customs said country's imports of refined copper dropped 2.7% year on year to 309,772 tons in April, or decreased 8.1% month on month from 337,125 tons.

According to the statistics released by the GAC, in the first four months of this year, the country's refined copper imports slightly declined 0.2% to 1.1 million tons from the same period in 2009.

The decrease of imports was attributed to the reducing of the Open futures positions and the Monetary tightening policy by government.

In 2009, the country consumed 5.94 million tons of copper, 20% more than in the previous year. The Customs also announced that China imported 606,091 tons of refined copper mine in April, up 17% year on year.

The April figure reflects a 12% growth from 540,774 tons in March. In the period from January to April, China's refined copper mine imports increased 20% from the same period of last year to 2.3 million tons.

Copper is the main raw material for the manufacture of power transmission cables.

China Copper