AUG. 22–GENEVA–China will pare down its tariffs on a host of nonwoven roll goods from rates as high as 23 percent to 10 percent by 2005, but the world’s most populous nation says it is not prepared to make additional cuts to industrial and agriculture levies.

“With so much of the cleanroom industry located or moving to China, the removal of import tariffs is a good thing,” Carl Lukach, global business director for Dupont Nonwovens (Old Hickory, Tenn.) told CleanRooms. “This is one element of cost that we would like see go away.”

The reduction, however, is a step in the right direction.

“It’s a good thing for customers in cleanrooms and makers of nonwoven goods. It’s a cost that is being removed from the system,” Lukach says. “The sooner we can get to a level playing field the better, especially within the cleanroom industry because it is moving across borders so rapidly.”

Jessica Franken, a government affiars associate for INDA, the Cary, N.C.-based Association of the Non-woven Fabrics Industry, shares Lukach’s sentiment.

“China will still have a tariff of 10 percent, while [the U.S.] maintains a zero tariff,” she says. “At the very least, we are seeing a reduction on nonwoven roll goods, and this is definitely a good thing because they have maintained these exorbitantly high tariff rates.”