China is largely self-sufficient in rice and wheat, but needs soybean imports for its livestock
Posted on 11/30/2019 8:39:07 AM PST by SeekAndFind
Global trade conflicts and the increasing trend towards unilateral trade agreements have raised alarm bells in Beijing about how China can continue to feed its 1.4 billion people.
Last month the State Council, the country’s cabinet, published a policy paper on food security – the first in 23 years. It said that while the current food supply situation was “very sound” it also flagged concerns about potential disruptions due to trade friction with the US. Climate change is another worry for future food production.
China’s devastating experiences with hunger and famine mean that the prospect of food shortages touches a raw nerve.
“In the medium to long term, China’s grain production and demand will remain closely aligned, which means China must not slacken its efforts to ensure food security,” the paper said, adding that the “international food trade is being disrupted by protectionism and unilateralism and showing increasing instability.”
Analysts say the “instability” word is the one that causes consternation in Beijing, but it is not just a concern in China.
The worst outcome is that trade wars will raise uncertainty and delay investment, including in new farming technologies, said David Laborde, a senior research fellow with the International Food Policy Research Institute.
He said the economic and demographic pressures that would result from climate change meant the world needed more technological innovation, but if trade conflicts undermined research and investment, then the world could face food shortages and higher prices in 10 or 20 years’ time.
(Excerpt) Read more at scmp.com ...
The more they have to spend on sustaining their population, the less they’ll have to spend on making mischief in the world.
What does the propaganda of ‘climate change’ have to do with commie agriculture practices? Stupid is as stupid does.
WWIII talk
They never let starving people get in their way before. Why would they start now?
Or they will be like pre-war Germany or Japan and use war as a pre-text to "sustain" their population.
800mm dead pigs. No water. Half the arable land of the US, with a fraction of the yield and 5x the population. Debt to GDP of 400%.
Yeah. They have things under control.
The last few Presidents have been criminal in propping up this basket case regime.
Should have been crushed 20 years ago.
When China has ended it’s prisoner organ harvesting program and no longer oppresses people for their religion and neither of those things can be shown to have happened for five years then we can worry about China’s needs.
Because they've created a monster in the form of a huge population that's gotten accustomed to the amenities of life in an industrialized country. It makes life a bit more precarious for the leadership.
They have too many people anyway. A little die-off would ease things.
China talks about “climate change” as propaganda merely intended for stupid westerners. In their own actual domestic efforts and policies, they ignore it.
Or they will be like pre-war Germany or Japan and use war as a pre-text to “sustain” their population.
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China has, for some time, already been very much like Japan and Germany of the 1930’s in their expansionist territorial ambitions. They’re capping that off with their desire to become the worldwide hegemon. This all may not end well.
Thank God for President Trump who has his eyes wide open to the threat!
The communist dictatorship of China like it or not is going to face a series of rec and eggs in the near future
Add making Christians fingerprinted and face scanned
Pure evil those commies are. Pure evil
Crush them like bugs
China needs to stop jailing its billionaire dissidents who work in biotech or reward its scientists trying to solve the mosquito and disease issue in its tropical area.
Are they doing this?
Last I saw, Alibaba founder, Jack Ma is alive, doing well and giving speeches.
China is also the largest buyer for some other crops, although I don’t know the full list. I know they import medicinal herbs by the ton. Particularly ginseng, because even the Chinese don’t trust Chinese producers.
Increased CO2 has led to a greening of the earth, moreso in the case of food crops.
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