May 18, 20262:33 PM GMT+2Updated 4 hours ago
CommentaryIndustry Insight from Ethical Corporation Magazine, a part of Thomson Reuters.
May 18 – The era of China as the world’s dominant agricultural buyer may be coming to an end. What replaces it could reshape global markets and prompt today’s producer countries to rethink their growth models.
Over the past two decades, China has driven global agricultural growth, running an agricultural commodity import deficit of $124.5 billion in 2024. These flows are highly concentrated: Brazil supplies more than 60% of soy and 40% of China’s beef, and the U.S. a further 30% of soy.
For a generation, global agriculture has been organised around a simple model: ever-growing demand from a single, dominant buyer. That era is now closing.
Recent climate shocks, geopolitical tensions and trade disruptions have exposed the fragility of China’s highly concentrated agricultural supply chains. As a result, China’s leadership has elevated food self-sufficiency to a core pillar of economic and national security. Its latest five-year plan, opens new tab, published in March, reinforces food security’s precedence over other major challenges such as energy supply, reinvigorating its property sector, fixing local government debt and strengthening cybersecurity.
Early signals suggest China is beginning to deploy the same playbook to food and agriculture that is delivering global leadership in green tech – such as aligning policy, capital and innovation to boost domestic productivity by cutting feed dependence and industrialising protein production.
In the near term, import demand may begin to decline. New analysis by Systemiq suggests efficiency gains alone could erase up to a quarter of soy demand this decade, almost equivalent to all U.S. soybean exports to China in 2024 and worth around $12 billion.
Meaningful reductions in beef, poultry, dairy and egg imports are also projected by 2030.
Longer term, this shift is likely to become structural. By 2040, analysis suggests China could become a net exporter of poultry, dairy, eggs and aquatic products, introducing Chinese food exports as a competitive force in global markets. By 2050, a further wave of innovation could make cultivated meats commercially viable. China is expected to play a growing role in supplying biomanufacturing, infrastructure and alternative protein inputs to global markets.01:20Moss-covered panels could offer air-cleaning cladding for city wallsSkip in 4s
This pivot represents a rebalancing of global agricultural markets. Markets are accustomed to supply shocks, which tend to be temporary. This is different: a demand shock from the system’s largest buyer would reshape markets for decades to come.
Producer countries will be the first to feel the effects of China’s transition. For these countries, few alternative markets are large enough to absorb displaced supply at scale. The risk is not only declining export volumes, but downward pressure on prices, with impacts hitting farm incomes, land valuations, rural employment and export revenues.
The environmental consequences of this transition are complex. Reduced demand for imported commodities could ease pressure on land conversion in producer countries, particularly where expansion has been driven by export demand. At the same time, greater domestic production in China may intensify pressure on already constrained natural resources. Water scarcity remains a structural challenge, and soil quality in key agricultural regions is limited. Expansion in aquaculture and feed production could also increase pressure on marine ecosystems, where China already has a significant global footprint.
Pascal LAMY 