Leather imports continue to grow

摘要

Despite cattle hide wettings being up 19% - 16.4 million cattle hides were soaked in 2002 compared with 13.8 million in 2001 - there was much gloom in the leather footwear segment of the business. Footwear imports grew to 1.6 billion pairs in 2002, up 8% from the previous year. China led the onslaught with 1.3 billion pairs out of the 1.6 billion. The average cost of a pair of non rubber footwear entering the US market from China was $6.92, down from $7.06 per pair in 2001. 'Upholstery leathers counted for most of the action in the import and export categories. Of the $2.1 billion in imports, $1.8 billion was in the upholstery categories.