(Agencies)
Updated: 2007-09-11 10:46

NEW YORK -- While US imports from China are rising, its exports to China are rising even faster, and one of the biggest exports is junk, a report in Newsweek  said on Monday.

"In an act of macroeconomic karma, materials thrown out by Americans -- broken-down auto bodies, old screws and nails (and many other items) -- accounted for $6.7 billion in exports to China in 2006, second only to aerospace products," Newsweek reported.

Recovered-paper exports soared to nearly 9.1 million metric tons in 2006, totaling $1.07 billion, from 348,000 metric tons in 1994, American Forest & Paper Association Chief Economist Stan Lancey told the magazine.

China has bought 58 percent of US scrap-paper exports this year.

Waste iron and steel rose to 2 million metric tons in 2006 from 166,000 in 1998, the report said.

"It's a seller's market right now," said P&T Metals Inc.Chief Executive Officer Kurt Rexius in South El Monte, Calif. P&T sends 80 percent of the materials it processes to Asian metal brokers.

China's demand for junk offsets the US trade deficit and "might help save the planet," Newsweek said.

US scrap dealers are part of a $65 billion industry that employs 50,000 people, the magazine said.