China's Rising GMO Rejections Annoy Trading Partners

China is causing consternation and puzzlement by detecting and rejecting genetically modified material in food shipments from trading partners from trading partners who claim that they don't grow GM crops. 

Chinese inspectors have rejected 146 shipments for containing GM material in the first half of 2026, up from a trickle in earlier years. More interesting is that Chinese inspectors have found GMOs in shipments of rapeseed oil, rice, flour, and soybean foods 

Compiled from China Administration of Customs.

Earlier this year, this blog reported that Chinese inspectors had reported 74 GMO-containing shipments of rapeseed oil from Kazakhstan, Russia, Ukraine and Belarus--countries that banned GMO crop production. At least one Kazakh exporter protested that it had verified that there was no GMO material in exports destined for China. 

 

Despite having suspended several Kazakh and 8 Russian rapeseed oil exporters, China rejected another 27 rapeseed oil shipments during April-June 2026, of which 18 were rejected from Russia and 9 were from Belarus. There were no Kazakh or Ukrainian shipments among the April-June rapeseed oil rejections. 

Now Indian officials are protesting China's rejection of rice from India after GM material turned up in Chinese labs. Indian news media reported in May that China had rejected 70 consignments of rice from India this year and 200 containers had been held back due to the risk of rejection. Reports posted on the Chinese customs web site showed rejections of 8 shipments totaling 2,652 metric tons in the first half of 2026 (I suspect the lists posted on the Chinese customs web site are only a partial list of rejections). 

Indian business and government officials pointed out that no genetically modified rice is grown in India and that shipments had been certified by a Chinese state-owned company before they left India. Some Indian commentators suspected that China was trying to sabotage the reputation of Indian rice, while others speculated that grain from another country could have been mixed with Indian rice. 

Chinese inspectors have also rejected 26 shipments of Japanese wheat flour this year for containing GMOs. This is another puzzling discovery since Japan does not grow GM wheat, and most exporting countries do not commercially produce GM wheat either due to consumer resistance around the world. 

Finally, Chinese inspectors also rejected 11 shipments of soybean-based food products from Taiwan for containing GMOs. Taiwan bans GM soybean production, though GM soybeans are imported for crushing to produce oil and soybean meal. In Taiwan, food products must be labeled if they contain at least 3% GM material, but China rejects shipments if they have even the smallest trace of GM material

The reasons behind the uptick in GMO rejections are not clear. Are Chinese inspectors just getting really good at detecting infinitesimal amounts of GM material? Are shipments being contaminated by other commodities? Are producers in other countries surreptitiously growing GMOs? Is China using GMO discoveries as a trade barrier to ease pressure on domestic rapeseed and rice producers? 

The uptick in Chinese rejections of GMOs could be related to the EU's rejections of Chinese rice flour for containing GMOs. China also denies growing GM rice, but there have been scandals in the past when GM rice grown in scientific trials leaked into the Chinese market. 

Russia has been China's top supplier of imported rapeseed oil over the last several years since China slapped extra duties on Canadian canola oil. Imports of Russian rapeseed oil have dropped off slightly since the rejections began in March, but imports from the UAE--which have had no rejections--have also slowed. Rapeseed oil from Kazakhstan and Belarus has never played a major role in the Chinese market.

Chinese customs data.

China's rejections of imports of rice from India coincide with China's attempt to sell off old rice from its reserves (which began in March). All but one of the Indian shipments rejected have been composed of broken rice, a cheap product that directly competes with aging rice from China's reserves. However, China has not rejected rice from other suppliers of broken rice: Vietnam, Myanmar, and Pakistan.

Chinese customs data.

China's rejections of flour from Japan and soybean food products from Taiwan have no apparent economic motive since neither plays a significant role in China's domestic market.