U.S. Secretary of Commerce Carlos M. Gutierrez said on Tuesday that the public comment period has now closed, and he will be leading an effort to finalize the new export control rules to China.

"U.S. exports to China are up 35 percent and we believe there's a great deal of room to grow," said Gutierrez.

"The bottom line is that export controls do not significantly reduce the volume of U.S. exports," he said, referring to strong protests from the U.S. companies.

Two dozen U.S. business groups, representing some of the biggest U.S. companies, such as Boeing and Microsoft, have urged the U.S. government to scrap the proposal to tighten national security controls on exports to China.

In a letter to the Commerce Department on last Friday, the groups complained that many of the goods embargoed by the regulation "are readily available to China's military from alternative sources, both foreign and indigenous."

"Our fundamental view is the regulation should be withdrawn and reconsidered in its entirety after thorough consultation with exporters," said the coalition of manufacturers, software companies and high-tech industry groups in the letter.

"Only a small percentage of U.S. exports would be affected by the military end-use licensing requirement," said Gutierrez.

In Fiscal Year 2006, 2.5 billion dollars in proposed exports to China needed a license, 4.6 percent of total U.S. exports of 52 billion dollars. Applications totaling 20 million dollars were denied, according to the Commerce Department.