China Has Great Opportunity for U.S Beef

Early last fall China announced that the ban on U.S. beef had been lifted — however there hasn't been much action since then. However, last week when President Trump met with the Chinese President U.S. beef access was one the priority items of discussion. National Cattlemen's Beef Association Director of International Trade Kent Bacus says that there should be more movement moving forward.

Bacus: "So even there has been nominal lifting of the ban from China, we still unable to send beef into the Chinese market because we face some technical barriers to trade. Over the next 100 days, Chinese and U.S. leaders are going identify a path forward where they are going to address some of these technical barriers to trade like traceability. So we do have some time before we see U.S. beef enter the Chinese market."

He continues

Bacus: "Well, when you consider that China already has one-fifth of the world's population and a middle-class greater than the entire U.S. population — there is a tremendous amount of opportunity to meet their protein demand. In recent years, China has become a major importing of beef — second only to the United States — most of that demand is being met from Australia, New Zealand and Brazil. We want to be a part of that obviously. We think that China will probably be another strong market for ribs, rounds, offals and for high-end beef in some of the major global centers like Beijing and Shanghai. But again, we produce a very safe and high quality product and we think we will have very bright future in China as soon as we can get our foot in the door."