Posted on 08/05/2019 1:02:16 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
China announced on Tuesday that it has suspended purchases of US agricultural products in retaliation for a “serious violation” of agreements between its President Xi Jinping and his counterpart Donald Trump.
Trump’s announcement last week that the US would put a new 10 per cent tariff on US$300 billion worth of imports from China was “a serious violation of the consensus of the heads of state of the two countries”, state news agency Xinhua said in a report issued soon after midnight.
China “has not ruled out import tariffs on US agricultural products purchased after August 3, and related Chinese companies have suspended purchasing US agricultural products,” Xinhua said.
“It is hoped that the US will conscientiously implement the consensus reached at the meeting between the heads of state of China and the United States, and have the confidence to implement the commitments to create the necessary conditions for cooperation in the agricultural fields between the two countries,” the report added.
After the two presidents held a summit during the G20 in Osaka, Japan in June, Xinhua reported that the two leaders had agreed to resume economic and trade negotiations, and that the US said it would not impose any new tariffs on Chinese products.
Trump told reporters after the meeting that: “We’re holding back on tariffs and they’re going to buy farm products”, adding that his meeting with Xi was “far better than expected.
Negotiations since the June meeting – including high-level talks in Shanghai last week between Chinese Vice-Premier Liu He, US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin – failed to produce any breakthrough concessions, prompting Trump to announce the new tariffs shortly after the US officials returned to Washington.
(Excerpt) Read more at scmp.com ...
No, America is not the only producer of agricultural goods. Only the number one ag producer in almost every category.
China cannot feed its people without help.
Apparently that fact has escaped your notice.
Brainless? LOL.
Modern economies are driven by people transforming materials in one form to products (including intermediate materials) of another form.
In the semi-primitive Chinese economy, automation does not alleviate the need for people.
If China cannot feed its people, it cannot operate their economy.
This isn’t just economics. It includes sociology.
An economy is made up of three major sectors, primary, secondary, and tertiary.
The primary sector is agriculture; a nation has to feed itself. The agriculture sector is made up of wheats and grains, fruits and vegetables, meats, nuts, juices, etc. A nation without an agriculture sector will starve.
The secondary sector is industry; a nation has to be able to make things. This sector is made up of metals and ores, chemicals and materials, refining and manufacturing, intermediate and finished products, etc. A nation has to make things to grow.
The tertiary sector is services; a nation has to maintain itself to sustain. This sector is made up of the trade services (electrical, plumbing, A/C, automotive, etc.), professional services (advertising and marketing, sales, information, tourism, sciences, etc. A nation has to service its industry or it will collapse.
Even if agriculture is small relative to manufacturing, it's crucial to survival. It's a primary need.
If China looks to Europe or South America to buy, it will displace the existing markets for those goods because they won't be able to meet China's demand and still feed themselves. They would in turn have to buy from American farmers to make up the shortfall of product that was diverted to the Chinese market.
Trump is trying to realign the global supply chain. The world still needs the goods that are being produced; the demand isn't going away and the current supply will be consumed. It's just going to traverse a different route than before from producer to consumer.
-PJ
Only because it is subsidized.
Farm subsidies ($25B) are 20% of the agri GDP!! LOL!!!
It sounds like China wants to reduce its population via starvation.
I hope Xi gets overthrown. I want the masked ripped off on the “we’re nice commies” con game.
After reading this Thread, I decided the solution has to be higher food prices. Farmers are not getting their fair share. Nobody works harder than the American farmers and take such a risk year after year. They deserve a fair price for their corn, soybeans, beef, pork and any other products they produce.
By the way if farmers cannot make a profit how may tractors, combines, planters and other equip manufactured in the US will be sold to these farmers?
Agriculture and its related industries provide 11 percent of U.S. employment
Food accounts for 12.9 percent of American households’ expenditures
Food manufacturing accounts for 14 percent of all U.S. manufacturing employees
Food and nutrition assistance programs make up the largest share of USDA outlays
Fake, fraud phony, plastic banana hiding behind your keyboard you oily twat.
Thank you for your articulate response.
If The Donald stops imports from the Chi- coms their economy crashes
If he were to do that here, wal mart would crash
More than a fair trade
Dear President Trump: Please just cut to the chase and impose a trade embargo on China and then cancel the H1-B visa program and send all of China’s spies back home where they belong!
China does not have to buy everything from the USA. There are other agricultural based countries that can pick up the slack. They are not going to cause starvation for their people.
“...but you can’t build one of these factories in 4 weeks CAN YOU?”
One of the amazing aspects of American manufacturing is the ability to retool and to do it quickly. Automobile factories retool every year and changing from producing cars to producing tanks would take about eight to ten weeks by modern standards.
In WW2 American factories took sometimes as little as a few days to retool from manufacturing consumer goods to producing war materiel.
Maytag retooled their existing washing machine production to making turrets for aircraft (it’s almost the same technology) and it took them about three weeks.
So, yes, it can be done if the will exists to do it.
But I suspect that if the US were to enter a serious war with China then the first enemies we’d have to defeat would be the ones we already have right here at home.
And the tools for that fight are already in your gun safe.
Were they buying the goods in the first place?
Let me make his more clear agriculture is 2% of employment( 4% if you count fishing and timber) and related industries are 10%. Fixed it.
Oh bunk. We subsidize them to the tune of $25B a year the little snow flakes. Manufacturing and industry are keys to becoming a 1st world nation. Our founders were all protectionists, every one of them.
Hear, hear!!! And eliminate ALL farm subsidies!!!
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