Australian Grains Industry Conference: Be wary of China reforms
Australian grain exporters will need to be wary of new disease and import standards in China as its Government starts to implement a range of revolutionary food safety and agriculture policy reforms.
That’s according to Beijing-based Chinese policy specialist Erlend Ek who spoke at yesterday’s Australian Grains Industry Conference in Melbourne.
Mr Ek, who is a researcher for China Policy, said Chinese media reported last month a shipment of Australian grain was stopped at a Chinese port due to new ergot standards which came into effect at the end of June.
Ergot is caused by a fungus, which besides reducing yields, can also be toxic to animals and humans.
Exports generally have a maximum tolerance level for any shipments which might harbour the ergot fungus.
Mr Ek said the Chinese government’s policy on food production was moving from being self sufficient to a more market-based approach where food quality and environmental concerns have become a priority.
“They are heading toward quality; they want to be seen as a quality producer,” Mr Ek said.
Mr Ek said as a result of the “massive changes” happening with food and agriculture policy in China, hundreds of new standards have been updated.
“They have just revised 6000 national standards for food,” he said.
“The ergot issue comes as a result of this.
“It was released 23 June and on 5 July there were reports that Australian ships were stopped (as a result of this standard).”
However sources have told The Weekly Times they were not aware of a shipment being stopped, and no Australian authorities had been told about an ergot issue with a grain shipment.
But they acknowledged ergot might be an issue in the future.
Other Chinese government changes includes the winding back of subsidies and price supports for local farmers, because price levels were well above global prices, Mr Ek said.
“Support and subsidy system is reaching its ceiling in its (World Trade Organisation) commitment moving away from market distortion and price support,” he said.
This was designed to make farmers more professional, and drive efficiency through the industry.
“China is at a critical stage of a transition from planned economy … toward a modern agriculture industry.
“(The government is saying) let’s make farming professional and more of an industry, and we need to allow other sectors to invest in agriculture.”
This will involve changing the current collective ownership structure of agricultural land, to allow companies and individuals to trade in the collective ownership of land.
This was expected to be confirmed at the Chinese government annual congress later this year.
However he said there was still opportunities for Australian agriculture these included providing grain exports, but quality standards would need to be met.
“Chinese production will hit 600 million tonnes by 2020, but and demand is expected to hit 700 million so they will need imports to make up (the difference,)” Mr Ek said.
“They imported about 105 million tonnes last year, and this year (imports) will hit 120 million tonnes, most of this is soybeans.”
Source: Weekly Times. Date: 2017-08-03
Latent risks as Aussie meat beefs up VN market share
As the demand for imported beef soars, Australian exporters are strengthening their market share in Vietnam, but the situation is fraught with risk, experts say.
A Dau tu (Investment Review) newspaper report says Vietnam has become one of the largest importers of Australian cattle. In 2016, it ranked fourth among 32 countries importing Australian cattle.
The report quoted Tong Xuan Chinh, deputy head of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development’s Animal Husbandry Department, as saying Vietnam began importing Australian cattle in 2010.
In 2012, the country had just four enterprises importing Australian cows but by 2015, the number had risen to several dozen with a total of 360,000 heads of cattle imported.
Vietnamese businesses are now rushing to import Australian cows and fattening them for sale to slaughterhouses. As a result, inventories of live cattle have swelled significantly.
The inventory of Australian live cattle in 2015 was estimated at 100,000 heads due to oversupply, Chinh told Dau tu, adding that in 2016, imports of cattle from Australia to Vietnam slowed dramatically as feedlot operators moved to lower their inventories.
Before 2010, Australian cattle exporters were not aware of the attractive Vietnamese market. Their main partner at the time was Indonesia, importing nearly 1 million cows from Australia per year, said Luong Minh Tung, Chairman of Yen Phu Beef and Dairy Cattle Breeding JSC in Ninh Binh province.
In 2011, the Australian government issued a ban on cow exports to Indonesia after reports surfaced about inhumane slaughter in some of its abattoirs, Tung said, adding that Australia also lost their strategic partner after the decision.
This was the context that Australian businesses, urgently looking for new partners, found Vietnamese ones, Tung said.
The import of Australian cattle for fattening had been expected to open up a new direction for the fed-cattle industry. However, Tung said, there were always latent risks in imports.
He said there were too many businesses involved in importing Australian cattle, which could lead to supply exceeding demand.
Instead of importing culled beef of large weights, Vietnamese firms preferred to import calves in order to fatten and sell to slaughterhouses, which offers greater profits, Tung said.
However, as Vietnam didn’t have favorable conditions like Australia to breed cows, local importers have to invest a lot in infrastructure to support the influx of Australian cattle, meeting strict importing-related requirements.
According to Hoang Dung, Director of the Hai Phong Investment and Animal Poultry Products Import Export JSC., or Animex Haiphong, Australia requires all slaughterhouses in importing countries to have modern equipment and comply with ECAS (exporter supply chain assurance system) needs.
Businesses whose abattoirs are not in line with ECAS will be banned from purchasing Australian cows.
Such bans could cause huge losses to many Vietnamese slaughterhouses, Dung said, adding that although there were thousands of standard slaughterhouses, only 100 units or so had been approved by the Australian side.
Dung also said many small and medium-scale cattle breeders were facing severe competition from large rivals, like the Hoang Anh Gia Lai Agriculture International JSC (HNG), which has poured trillions of dong into importing Australian cattle to Vietnam for fattening and selling.
“Small businesses usually import several thousand heads of cattle each time and will purchase more only after they have already sold them out. Meanwhile, HNG buys 30,000 to 40,000 heads of cattle each time,” Dung said.
The Da utu report said that at the end of 2016, the Viet Eco Farm JSC. launched a beef store chain called “Healthy beef” in Can Tho city, providing fresh, high quality Australian beef products in large quantities.
In the short term, the company aims to supply beef for the Mekong Delta region, but plans to expand its market in other parts of the country, establishing new distribution channels.
Viet Eco Farm also imports Australian calves to fatten and sells mature cows to abattoirs at thousands of heads per time. The company has invested a lot in breeding facilities and modern slaughter lines, and set up 450ha of pasture land to raise cattle.
Chairman of the Vietnam Livestock Association Nguyen Dang Quang said the amount of imported Australian cattle was increasing rapidly, being sold at reasonable prices, enjoying preferential tariffs and becoming more popular with Vietnamese consumers.
Australian beef is “dominating” the Vietnamese market, Quang said, adding that the more fierce rivalry between Vietnamese firms, the more benefits Australia exporters could enjoy.
Quang said it is imperative the country imposes technical barriers on Australian beef so as to protect the domestic cattle industry.
Source: VNA. Date: 2017-08-03
China’s love of wine drives thirst for knowledge
The speed with which China has become Australia’s largest wine market (by value) is extraordinary.
In calendar 2000 China imported $1.34 million of our wine; by 2016 it reached $520m, three months later in March it had reached $568m, a year-on-year growth of 41 per cent.
France is its leading supplier, with 44 per cent of the market, Australia is second with 25 per cent, and Chile (with a long-standing free trade agreement) third with 16 per cent. Chile’s exports (largely bulk) are declining, and Australia’s growth rate is greater than that of France. Wheels of all sorts are driving the dynamics, some more obvious than others.
The two-way trade of products and services between China and Australia is many times greater than that between China and France. More Chinese arrive in Australia every day than any other country. Chinese returning home become brand ambassadors for wine and its use in everyday living.
Despite all this, the Chinese wine market is immature.
While there is a thirst for knowledge evidenced by the many wine courses now run in China — the multi-level British Wine and Spirit Education Trust course is most important — a large gap still exists between theory and application.
Even for some hoping to become professionals (sommeliers, writers, teachers, retailers), having a glass with meals at home for casual enjoyment can still be a step too far, but not on the basis of gender. On a trip to China in May, Wine Australia arranged for 15 Chinese wine professionals (of varying experience) to each ask me one question. All were in their 20s or 30s, and all but one were female. But the statistics don’t lie. The middle and middle-upper classes who live in one of the hundred cities with a population of more than one million, have the income to fund ever-increasing consumption.
At the other end of the scale is the demand for high quality South Australian shiraz, led by Penfolds Grange and its other luxury brands.
These wines are purely aspirational for upper-middle-class buyers, but well within the reach of the millions of wealthy consumers. Treasury Wine Estates’ share price is a direct reflection of this. Then there is the so far largely ignored white wine sector. The split is 88 per cent red wine, 12 per cent white, utterly at odds with the greater compatibility of white wines with cuisine and all but winter temperatures.
Source: The Australian Business Review.
China orders halt to red meat imports from several Australian meatworks
China has temporarily banned beef imports from six Australian meatworks, the Federal Government has confirmed.
Australia was made aware of the ban on Tuesday, and Trade Minister Steven Ciobo told the ABC he intended to work closely and constructively with industry and China to resolve the issue as quickly as possible.
The ABC understands the affected abattoirs are in Queensland and NSW, and include two facilities owned by Australia’s largest meat processor JBS.
Other companies affected are Kilcoy Pastoral, Australian Country Choice, the Northern Rivers Co-operative at Casino, and Thomas Food.
Mr Ciobo said the ban related to Chinese concern about labelling non-compliance.
There is no suggestion health or food safety issues are involved.
“This is obviously a very material situation,” Mr Ciobo said.
“We’ve got, potentially, very significant amounts of trade involved in this and so it’s a matter that I’m very mobilised on, my team, my office, as well as our embassy in China.”
Government adopts proactive approach
Mr Ciobo said Australia and China had a strong relationship that “sees us work through irritants”, such as Australia’s recent ban on prawn imports.
“We intend to engage in a very constructive way,” Mr Ciobo said, and sought to reassure the beef industry the Government would adopt a very “proactive” approach.
The Australian Meat Industry Council confirmed it was working with the Department of Agriculture through diplomatic channels on the issue.
There are shipments currently on the water.
The ABC understands the Australian industry believes it has resolved the labelling issues, and the Government is hopeful it can resolve the issue before those ships arrive in China.
The Australian Department of Agriculture and Water Resources issued a statement on Wednesday saying the six affected export establishments were reported as suspended on the Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of China website.
“The department is working with industry and Chinese authorities to resolve the matter urgently,” the statement read.
Australia’s beef exports to China were worth more than $600 million last year, and China is the fourth-largest market.
More beef and lamb processors were given approval in March to export chilled meat to China in a deal struck at the highest level, between the Chinese Premier and the Australian Prime Minister.
But Australian exporters are also now confronted with a new competitor in the market as China opens up to US beef imports for the first time in 13 years.
Source: ABC News. Date: 2017-07-27
Vietnam’s agro-forestry-aquatic exports hit 20.45 billion USD in 7 months
The export value of agro-forestry-aquatic products reached 20.45 billion USD in the first seven months of this year, up 14.7 percent against the same period last year, reported to the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.
Key farm produce raked in 10.89 billion USD (up 18 percent) while aquatic products earned 4.31 billion USD (up 17.5 percent) and forestry products brought home 4.41 billion USD (up 10.8 percent).
Vietnam shipped 3.3 million tonnes of rice worth 1.5 billion USD abroad, up 15.7 percent in volume and 13.7 percent in value compared to the Jan-July period of 2016.
Meanwhile, coffee and cashew nut exports maintained stable growth in the period thanks to higher prices. The country earned 2.12 billion USD from exporting 937,000 tonnes of coffee and 1.83 billion USD from shipping 186,000 tonnes of cashew nuts.
Vegetable and fruit exports witnessed a year-on-year rise of 50 percent in export value to 2.03 billion USD in the reviewed period.
The export value of rubber also recorded a strong surge, reaching 1.13 billion USD, 59 percent higher than that in the same period last year.
Meanwhile, pepper export turnover suffered an 18 percent fall to 800 million USD due to a 30 percent drop in prices.
Source: VNA. Date: 2017-07-27
Why IoT, big data & smart farming are the future of agriculture
The farming industry will become arguably more important than ever before in the next few decades.
The world will need to produce 70% more food in 2050 than it did in 2006 in order to feed the growing population of the Earth, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. To meet this demand, farmers and agricultural companies are turning to the Internet of Things for analytics and greater production capabilities.
Technological innovation in farming is nothing new. Handheld tools were the standards hundreds of years ago, and then the Industrial Revolution brought about the cotton gin. The 1800s brought about grain elevators, chemical fertilizers, and the first gas-powered tractor. Fast forward to the late 1900s, when farmers start using satellites to plan their work.
The IoT is set to push the future of farming to the next level. Smart agriculture is already becoming more commonplace among farmers, and high tech farming is quickly becoming the standard thanks to agricultural drones and sensors.
Below, we’ve outlined IoT applications in agriculture and how “Internet of Things farming” will help farmers meet the world’s food demands in the coming years.
High Tech Farming: Precision Farming & Smart Agriculture
Farmers have already begun employing some high tech farming techniques and technologies in order to improve the efficiency of their day-to-day work. For example, sensors placed in fields allow farmers to obtain detailed maps of both the topography and resources in the area, as well as variables such as acidity and temperature of the soil. They can also access climate forecasts to predict weather patterns in the coming days and weeks.
Farmers can use their smartphones to remotely monitor their equipment, crops, and livestock, as well as obtain stats on their livestock feeding and produce. They can even use this technology to run statistical predictions for their crops and livestock.
And drones have become an invaluable tool for farmers to survey their lands and generate crop data.
As a concrete example, John Deere (one of the biggest names in farming equipment) has begun connecting its tractors to the Internet and has created a method to display data about farmers’ crop yields. Similar to smart cars, the company is pioneering self-driving tractors, which would free up farmers to perform other tasks and further increase efficiency.
All of these techniques help make up precision farming or precision agriculture, the process of using satellite imagery and other technology (such as sensors) to observe and record data with the goal of improving production output while minimizing cost and preserving resources.
Future of Farming: IoT, Agricultural Sensors, & Farming Drones
Smart agriculture and precision farming are taking off, but they could just be the precursors to even greater use of technology in the farming world.
BI Intelligence, Business Insider’s premium research service, predicts that IoT device installations in the agriculture world will increase from 30 million in 2015 to 75 million in 2020, for a compound annual growth rate of 20%.
The U.S. currently leads the world in IoT smart agriculture, as it produces 7,340 kgs of cereal (e.g. wheat, rice, maize, barley, etc.) per hectare (2.5 acres) of farmland, compared to the global average of 3,851 kgs of cereal per hectare.
And this efficiency should only improve in the coming decades as farms become more connected. OnFarm, which makes a connected farm IoT platform, expects the average farm to generate an average of 4.1 million data points per day in 2050, up from 190,000 in 2014.
Furthermore, OnFarm ran several studies and discovered that for the average farm, yield rose by 1.75%, energy costs dropped $7 to $13 per acre, and water use for irrigation fell by 8%.
Given all of the potential benefits of these IoT applications in agriculture, it’s understandable that farmers are increasingly turning to agricultural drones and satellites for the future of farming.
The future of farming is in collecting and analyzing big data in agriculture in order to maximize efficiency. But there are far more trends to understand with the IoT, and the Internet of Things will touch many more industries than just farming.
Source: Business Insider. Date: 2017-07-27
Post-harvest technologies needed to increase farm produce competitiveness
Using post-harvest technologies is crucial to increase the competitive edge of farm produce, heard a recent workshop in Ho Chi Minh City.
The event was held by the Tropical Agricultural Research and Consultancy Centre in HCM City and the Biotechnology Centre of HCM City on July 15.
Director of the Protective Packaging Solutions company SancoPack Pham Quoc Bao said developing preservation technologies is important to help farmers reduce losses in quantity and to maintain the quality of farm produce.
In Vietnam, post-harvest losses for seed plants were estimated at 10 percent, tubers at 10-20 percent and vegetables and fruits 10-30 percent, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organisations (FAO).
This is mainly due to incorrect harvesting, packaging, transporting and preserving techniques, the FAO said, adding that packaging technologies in Vietnam are underdeveloped.
To increase the competitiveness of Vietnamese farm produce, post-harvest preservation will receive special attention from farmers and businesses.
Notably, the Chemistry Institute under the Vietnam Academy of Science and Technology has studied a technology called “GreenMAP” which keeps vegetables and fruits fresh three times as long as traditional methods without chemical impacts.
This new technology is simple, cheap and reduces post-harvest losses by 5 percent.
Experts suggested attracting young human resources to the agricultural sector and providing training courses for them.
Source: VNA.
Agricultural imports in 2017 rise rapidly
China’s imports of major agricultural products continued to increase fast in the first five months of the year, driven by price gaps between domestically produced products and imported products, according to the Ministry of Agriculture.
Wheat imports between January and May reached 2.2 million metric tons, an increase of 67.3 percent year-on-year, while import of soybeans increased by nearly 20 percent to 37 million tons, and imports of beef rose by 14 percent during the period, compared with the same period last year, Wang Ping, deputy chief of the ministry’s Department of Market and Economic Information, said at a news conference on Monday.
China imported 1.68 million tons of wheat and associated products between January and April, an increase of 94 percent over the same period last year, Wang said, citing figures from the General Administration of Customs.
Imports of some major agricultural products kept increasing quickly between 2011 and 2016, with grain imports increasing at an average annual rate of 32.2 percent, meat at an average annual rate of 24.9 percent, and dairy at 16.6 percent during the five-year period, according to the ministry.
“A rapid increase in imports has also had a great impact on China’s domestic market for agricultural products,” Wang said.
“Due to a sustained increase in imports, it is predicted that beef and mutton prices in the domestic market may fall slightly this year.”
The prices of many agricultural products produced in China are higher than the international level due to higher production costs, according to the Ministry of Agriculture. An exception is corn, whose average wholesale price was 1.58 yuan (23 cents) per kilogram in the first part of the year, similar to the international level, a decrease of 14.4 percent year-on-year, according to the ministry.
Dairy industry analyst Song Liang said the average cost of dairy products in China was at least 20 percent higher than in the European Union, largely due to higher production costs resulting from limited resources such as water and grazing land. This has caused a rapid increase in dairy imports, he said.
Due to causes such as increasing supply, prices of agricultural products in China in general have kept falling since the beginning of this year, with prices of fresh and perishable products, such as vegetables, pork, chicken and eggs seeing the biggest decline, Wang, from the Ministry of Agriculture, said.
For example, the price of eggs decreased to their lowest in the last 10 years in the first half of the year before rebounding recently, and the price of poultry also declined in the first half of the year, Wang said.
The major causes were increased production, as a result of higher poultry and egg prices two years ago and the falling prices of feed such as corn, and an increase in H7N9 bird flu cases during the first half of the year in China, he said.
The price of eggs started to rise in June due to reduced supply following sustained lower prices since late last year, Wang said.
Egg prices may continue to rise in the second half of the year, but at a slow rate due to adequate supply, he said.
The prices of some other major agricultural products, such as pork and vegetables, may also rebound in the second half of the year, Wang said.
Source: China Daily.
ADB: Climate Change Threatens Asia’s Development Gains
Asia’s hard-won development gains are at risk of being reversed by the effects of climate change, according to the Asian Development Bank (ADB). However, the news is not all bad for the region, with new energy investments expected to cement its leadership in the “clean industrial revolution.”
The warning on climate change follows U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw the world’s second-biggest emitter from the Paris Agreement, even while the rest of the Group of 20, including the world’s largest emitter, China, have vowed to press ahead with emissions reductions.
Released Friday at the bank’s headquarters in Manila, the report produced by the ADB and the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) makes for grim reading, should the predictions eventuate. Under a “business as usual” scenario, a 6 degree Celsius temperature rise is projected over the Asian landmass by the end of the century, with an increase as high as 8 degrees C forecasted in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, and northwest China.
“These increases in temperature would lead to drastic changes in the region’s weather system, agriculture and fisheries sectors, land and marine biodiversity, domestic and regional security, trade, urban development, migration, and health. Such a scenario may even pose an existential threat to some countries in the region and crush any hope of achieving sustainable and inclusive development,” the report said.
Among the predicted effects are more intense tropical cyclones and typhoons, with coastal and low-lying areas at increased risk of flooding. Global flood losses are expected to reach $52 billion a year by 2050 compared to $6 billion in 2005.
Thirteen of the top 20 cities seen suffering the largest growth in flood losses are located in the Asia-Pacific, comprising Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Tianjin, Zhanjiang, and Xiamen in China; Chennai-Madras, Kolkata, Mumbai, and Surat in India; Jakarta, Indonesia; Nagoya, Japan; Bangkok, Thailand; and Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
Yet while annual precipitation is expected to increase by up to 50 percent over most land areas in Asia, countries like Afghanistan and Pakistan could see a decline in rainfall by 20 to 50 percent, the ADB said.
Food production will suffer as a result, with production costs also rising. In some Southeast Asian nations, rice yields could decline by up to 50 percent by 2100 “if no adaptation efforts are made,” while almost all crops in Uzbekistan could see a 20 to 50 percent decline even under a 2 degree Celsius temperature rise.
Food shortages could increase the number of malnourished children in South Asia by 7 million, as food import costs surge to $15 billion a year by 2050 compared to $2 billion.
Major disruptions to current farming communities could prompt mass migration to the cities, fueling overcrowding and overwhelming social services.
Energy security could also be threatened, due to the reduced capacities of thermal power plants from a scarcity of cooling water and the potentially intermittent performance of hydropower. This could fuel conflicts as countries compete for limited energy supply, the report warned.
Meanwhile, marine ecosystems such as coral reefs will be in serious danger. In the Western Pacific, all coral reef systems will suffer mass coral bleaching if global warming increases by 4 degree Celsius, yet even a 1.5 degree C temperature rise would cause serious bleaching to 89 percent of coral reefs, damaging reef-related fisheries and tourism.
These losses could amount to billions of dollars, judging by a recent estimate that Australia’s Great Barrier Reef is worth A$56 billion ($44 billion) in tourism and other economic benefits, or the equivalent of 12 Sydney Opera Houses.
Climate change would also cause damaging health effects, with heat-related deaths among the elderly expected to increase by 52,000 by 2050, according to World Health Organization data. Deaths related to diseases such as malaria and dengue could also rise, adding to the death toll from outdoor air pollution, which is already causing 3.3 million deaths each year globally, led by China, India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh.
Asia is already experiencing the effects of climate change, accounting for nearly 30 percent of total global economic losses caused by extreme weather between 2000 and 2008, according to the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Ratings agency Standard & Poor’s has also suggested that Cambodia, Vietnam, and Bangladesh are the world’s most vulnerable countries to climate change, based on factors including agricultural output and adaptive capacity.
Economic Opportunity
However, Asia’s response to climate change provides it with an economic opportunity too, as noted by PIK director Professor Hans Joachim Schellnhuber.
“On the one hand, Asian greenhouse-gas emissions have to be reduced in a way that the global community can limit planetary warming to well below 2 degrees Celsius, as agreed in Paris 2015. Yet even adapting to 1.5 degrees Celsius temperature rise is a major task,” he said.
“So, on the other hand, Asian countries have to find strategies for ensuring prosperity and security under unavoidable climate change within a healthy global development. But note that leading the clean industrial revolution will provide Asia with unprecedented economic opportunities. And exploring the best strategies to absorb the shocks of environmental change will make Asia a crucial actor in 21st-century multilateralism.”
Asia has already become a world leader in clean energy investment, led by China, which plans to spend 2.5 trillion yuan ($369 billion) on renewable power generation by 2020. Both China and India are seen attracting $4 trillion worth of clean energy investment by 2040, helping to decouple economic growth from emissions, according to Bloomberg New Energy Finance.
The ADB has backed such efforts with a record $3.7 billion in climate financing in 2016, which it has committed to reaching $6 billion by 2020. Rival Beijing-led lender, the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, has also pledged to support investments in renewable energy and energy efficiency as part of the Paris Agreement, noting that more than 1 billion people in Asia still lack access to secure and clean electricity.
The ADB considers the coming decade as crucial in implementing mitigation measures, since the “business as usual” scenario projected under the Paris accord would render any adaptation efforts ineffective.
Despite a 10-fold rise in per capita incomes over the past 25 years, Asia still remains home to two-thirds of the world’s poor, risking even deeper poverty and disaster should mitigation and adaptation efforts fail.
Fortunately for the world’s most economically dynamic region, Asia still has “both the capacity and weight of influence to move toward sustainable development pathways, curb global emissions, and promote adaptation,” the report concluded.
The message could not be any clearer for Asia’s policymakers, should they wish to sustain the region’s stunning economic success.
Source: The Diplomat.
China approves two more GMO crops for import, DuPont disappointed
China has approved two more genetically modified (GMO) crops for import, the Ministry of Agriculture said, the second such move in the past month to expand access to biotech seeds as part of Beijing’s 100-day trade talks with Washington.
The two new crops, approved from July 16 for a period of three years, are Syngenta’s 5307 insect-resistant corn sold under the Agrisure Duracade brand and Monsanto’s 87427 glyphosate-resistant corn, sold under the Roundup Ready brand, the ministry said on its website on Monday.
The move brings total approvals to four after the government last month gave the go-ahead to Dow Chemical Co’s Enlist corn and Monsanto’s Vistive Gold soybeans.
But it leaves four other products owned by Monsanto, DuPont and Dow still on a waiting list pending approval from Beijing.
DuPont was “disappointed” its Pioneer insect-resistant corn was not included, a spokeswoman said in an email. The other three are Dow’s Enlist soybeans and two alfalfa products developed by Monsanto.
Dow’s Asia Pacific media relations representative Eileen Zeng could not be immediately reached nor could Monsanto’s China corporate affairs manager Lian Meng for comment.
Hopes that all six would get the go ahead in the second round mounted after the National Biosafety Committee (NBC), a group of experts who advise the government on GMO safety, met late last month to review the six remaining products, company executives and experts said.
The first batch of approvals also followed an NBC meeting. The government has not confirmed the meeting took place or commented any further on the issue.
The approvals come after China promised to speed up a review of pending import applications as part of the 100-day trade talks with the United States. China is the top export market for U.S. agricultural products.
While the country does not permit planting of GMO food crops, it does allow GMO imports such as soybeans and corn for use in its animal feed industry.
Getting new varieties approved for import takes years, forcing leading agrichemical players to restrict sales during China’s review process.
Earlier this year, DuPont Pioneer began a limited commercial introduction of its next-generation Qrome corn products under stewardship in the Western United States, allowing it to make the new technology available to some growers ahead of Chinese approval.
DuPont continues to cooperate with Chinese regulators, the spokeswoman said, but added that “global markets should conduct predictable, transparent regulatory reviews based on sound science and be free from political influence”.
The U.S. industry has repeatedly complained about the lack of transparency in China’s biotech review process.
Beijing has in the past held back approvals of imported GMO products amid concerns about anti-GMO sentiment in the country.
Source: Reuters.
