Replace and clarification: This story has been up to date to mirror terminology utilized in Chinese language commodity reporting, the place fibers labeled as “hemp” could also be labeled inside broader bast-fiber classes. This resulted in beforehand reported figures that possible overstated hemp imports particularly.
China’s imports of fiber reported as “hemp” had been minimize in half in 2025 after a steep rise over the last few years, signaling some volatility on this planet’s most essential marketplace for bast fibers utilized in textile manufacturing.
In keeping with Chinese language customs figures, the nation imported 44,370 metric tons of such fibers in 2025, down from 92,744 tons in 2024, a decline of 52.16%.
The figures are reported as “hemp” in Chinese language commodity knowledge, however they sit inside a broader bast-fiber system that features flax, jute and different plant fibers which are usually substituted or blended in textile manufacturing. In consequence, they need to be learn as indicative relatively than a exact measure of hemp-specific imports.
As a result of the class consists of overlapping bast fibers, the decline could mirror substitution results — with hemp probably shedding share to competing supplies corresponding to flax — relatively than a purely hemp-specific contraction. Remoted figures for hemp don’t appear to be reported, however SunSirs, a Chinese language analyst that tracks commodities, attributed the drop to “the numerous enhance within the planting space of (industrial) hemp in Northeast China in 2024,” which boosted home raw-material availability for 2025.
Demand shift
The drop issues as a result of China is the market-moving purchaser of bast fibers utilized in spinning, blended yarns and textile conversion. Publicly cited commerce figures point out the grouping of imports led by flax, hemp and jute, rose from simply 837 tons in 2020 to tens of hundreds of tons by 2023–2025, as Chinese language mills leaned extra closely on imported provide to enhance home manufacturing.
The sharp reversal now factors to a market that may change rapidly relying on home acreage, competing fibers and downstream textile demand, the analyst mentioned.
France leads
Regardless of the downturn, the figures recommend France has strengthened its place as the primary European gateway into China’s general natural-fiber market, with French producers supplying 74.29% of China’s imports in 2025, up from 63.66% in 2024. Belgium, the subsequent largest single importer to China, fell to three.26% from 19.73% a yr earlier. Different principal suppliers over the previous two years had been Russia, Netherlands and Ukraine. These figures primarily characterize flax imports, however embody hemp, jute and different minor fibers.
Way back to 2020, China agreed to buy an unspecified quantity of hemp fiber from america as a part of a complete $12.5 billion agriculture commerce deal, however there’s little to point any commerce happened as U.S. producers had been merely not set as much as produce any important quantity.
Export aspect
At the same time as fiber imports fell final yr, China stays the world’s largest exporter of textile merchandise labeled as hemp — a class that features giant volumes of flax and blended supplies — with greater than 3,500 tons of yarn and over 16 million meters of material shipped overseas. Fibers, yarns, materials and completed items totaled $2.018 billion in 2025, down 15.23% from 2024, SunSirs mentioned.
Exports reached practically 200 nations, with main markets throughout Asia and in Italy, Spain, Turkey and america.
Exports to america rose 1.75% yr over yr, although no bilateral greenback worth was reported. “Within the face of such a changeable U.S. tariff coverage, the expansion of exports to america nonetheless displays the inflexible demand for (pure fiber) textile merchandise within the U.S. market to some extent,” SunSirs mentioned.
Amongst shipments to the U.S., materials accounted for 33.19% and completed merchandise 66.81%.
