Investigate Midwest (https://investigatemidwest.org/tag/china/)
The big agricultural firms are in part playing defense. Grain traders supply the world’s livestock farms with animal feed - a business that would suffer if fake meat sales rise at the expense of real meat.
In retaliation for some of the U.S. tariffs, China cut off imports of U.S. agricultural products like soybeans and corn. That's led to agribusiness companies like Deere & Co. to announce it's cutting production by 20%.
A controversy we’ve covered in the past has resulted in a shut down for a Missouri animal farm.
A Brazilian-owned meat processing company undercut its competition by more than $1 per pound to win nearly $78 million in pork contracts through a federal program launched to help American farmers offset the impact from an ongoing trade war.
A new spinoff from DowDupont could mean fewer
seed and pesticide options for farmers, who are already facing mounting
challenges that include low commodity prices, poor weather conditions and a
growing trade war. On June 1, DowDuPont separated its
agricultural chemical and seed business into a standalone company called
Corteva Agriscience. Dow Chemical and Dupont Nemours, Inc. merged in 2017, and made $86 billion in sales last year. Its agriculture division provided pesticides and seeds to farmers, but the company also made paints, silicone and other chemicals in its material science and specialty products divisions. Before the merger, Dow offered more pesticide products to farmers, while Dupont sold more variety of seeds.
When it comes to China rarely are things as they seem, there is no deal till there is a deal, and even after the ink dries China is fully capable of ignoring what they promised if it suits their national interests.
Breaking out major prognostic tools (including an 8-ball, Ouija board, paper fortune teller and dart board...yeah we're high tech around here) here are some of the big agricultural issues on the horizon for 2019.
In the past year Dave Dickey has blogged and waxed on a number of consequential agricultural events. Find out which ag story was the the most consequential in 2018.
The United States has been in a trade war with China over the last several months, swapping import tariffs worth billions of dollars stemming from U.S. investigations into China's trade practices including “technology transfer, intellectual property, and innovation.” This timeline shows how we got here.
Thousands of companies have sought to be excluded from tariffs on goods imported from China while dozens of members of Congress have sought to make the process better.