Dim Sums: Agricultural Markets in China

You probably never thought about how China uses horse piss to keep its Central Asian colonies under control and to compete with giant multinational pharmaceutical companies. A Kazak man collects horse urine. Source: Tianshan Net (Xinjiang Daily) Suppose you're an insecure East Asian country whose population mostly lives within 500 miles of the Pacific Ocean. To your west there's a big, mostly empty territory populated by nomadic ethnic groups. You're worried that powerful neighbors will gain control over this territory and end up right outside your back door. Plus the territory has land where you can grow crops, launch rockets, and extract minerals and petroleum.  So you move into this area, subjugate it, and claim it as part of your country. You unimaginatively name it "New Territory" while claiming it has always been part of your country. You set up an archipelago of military farming and industrial settlements populated by your ethnic group. You don't want e...

Chinese data show a decline in chemical fertilizer that purportedly demonstrates their farmers are reversing their notoriously excessive fertilizer use. But what if the decline in fertilizer use actually reflects a decline in China's agricultural production? China reported another record grain harvest last week for 2023, Many observers in China were skeptical about the data since the farmland base has been shrinking, there were floods and drought this year, and grain imports are up 7 percent so far in 2023. State media issued a rebuttal to these suspicions , insisting the data are correct. Chinese statistics show a 17-percent decrease in use of chemical fertilizer use from 2015 to 2022, yet grain output has increased in all but one year during that time--more grain with less fertilizer. Hmm... 2015 was the year Chinese officials launched an action plan to cut annual growth in fertilizer use to zero by 2021. The statistics immediately began showing a decrease in fertilizer use! ...

Falling agricultural prices suggest something happened to let the air out of China's economy in October.  Weekly farm commodity procurement prices reported by the State Commodity Reserves Administration showed steep declines in corn and soybean prices during October; they seemed to stabilize in November. Rice prices increased and wheat prices were relatively steady. Calculated from weekly procurement prices reported by State Administration of Grain and Commodity Reserves  Most agricultural raw material prices paid by enterprises peaked in September and fell at varying paces during October and November.  Calculated from prices reported three times per month by China National Bureau of Statistics. The two data sources agree that corn and soybean prices went down over the last three months and rice prices went up. Soybean meal had the steepest decline (-17.5%), followed by peanuts (-15.7%) and hogs (-13.2%). Calculated from price indices shown above. Monthly CPI reports indi...

China's plan to modernize Africa's agriculture received much praise and fanfare at a China-Africa agricultural cooperation forum held in China's Hainan Island this week.  The "Plan for China Supporting Africa’s Agricultural Modernization" (along with plans for the continent's industrialization and personnel training) was unveiled by Xi Jinping at the August BRICS forum in South Africa . The plan includes technology transfer by Chinese experts, building a China-Africa tropical agriculture R&D center, establishing a China-Africa R&D innovation alliance, training African technicians and managers, and promoting China-Africa trade in agricultural goods.  China implies that its plan is superior to western approaches to aiding Africa. The plan's preamble announces that "China is ready to further explore new pathways of agricultural cooperation with Africa." China bills its plan as "south-south cooperation": one "developing countr...

Vietnam has a vaccine for African swine fever (ASF). China does not.  ASF is a virus that spreads quickly and causes hemorrhaging and death in most infected pigs. ASF first jumped from Europe to China in 2018. Then the virus jumped over the Chinese border to Vietnam within months after it had reached China. Swine herds were decimated in both countries.  Scientists in Europe and elsewhere had been working on ASF vaccines for many years. Yet by early 2020--about 18 months after the country's first outbreaks--China's Harbin Veterinary Institute  said it had developed a vaccine for ASF  that was safe and effective. The vaccine was a live attenuated vaccine created by deleting genes from the virus. The Institute bragged on its web site:  “The vaccine is currently the most promising vaccine for industrial application and will provide important technical means for the effective prevention and control of African Swine Fever in China and related countries.”  Four mo...

China's heightened concerns about invasive species are adding more red tape and record-keeping requirements to the import process. A new set of requirements for soybean shipments probably contributed to reported delays in customs clearance over the past 6 months.  On July 22, 2023 China customs announced  that each port of entry will conduct a 3-year campaign to crack down on invasive species in imported cargoes and smuggling. According to the announcement growth in international trade has resulted in a growing number of invasive species entering the country, presenting a growing risk. In the first half of 2023 authorities said they intercepted 599 species of nonnative animals and plants, including giant centipedes, savage harvest ants, and spotted salamanders, and "exotic pets" brought in by criminal gangs. Problems include illegal mailing of seeds, plants hidden in shipments of toys, and smuggled tiger bones.  More than 20 years ago, scientists from China's Academy ...

A video circulating in China last week may be the latest example of emboldened rural officials clearing aging villagers off collectively owned farmland. These enclosures with Chinese characteristics can be motivated by the need to increase productivity, lucrative opportunities to grow ornamental shrubs, or just plain corruption. The only power villagers have to assert their interests is their sheer numbers...and that's exactly what communist leaders are most afraid of. The video  appeared to show dozens of villagers stealing corn from a large field in Henan Province. A corn combine unable to complete its harvest sat idle as elderly villagers scooped up ears of corn into bags and loaded them into motorized carts parked in the field. Sirens sounded as police showed up but there were too many people to arrest. The operator of an idled corn combine unable to complete his harvesting work took a video of villagers fighting over a bag of corn in the field. While the videos circulati...