appConfigEntityId

bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

isVideo

articlePageQuery

article

articleSchemaContent

content

hooksArticlePageAdvertisementConfigArticle

hooksArticlePageFloatingButtonConfigArticle

appConfig

filter

json

liveArticle

Cary Huang

There is a Chinese idiom, “food is the god of the people”, that speaks volumes about the utmost significance of feeding the world’s most populous nation.
Since ancient times, China’s rulers have seen the stable and sufficient supply of food as the most critical issue in maintaining political, social and economic stability in the Middle Kingdom – and thus their legitimacy of rule.
However, the Covid-19 pandemic has shaken the global food supply and could bring about a food crisis if governments fail to manage the challenge well, as warned by the heads of three global agencies – the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation, the World Health Organisation and the World Trade Organisation.
Emerging economies with large populations, just like China, are particularly vulnerable to such a crisis.
Coronavirus has lit the fuse on a time bomb in China’s economy: debt
The coronavirus is making it harder to grow food not only in China but also around the world, as lockdowns and travel restrictions cause labour shortages in the farming sector. Logistics disruptions have broken supply chains and severely obstructed the flow of food to China, the world’s largest food consumer and importer.

Quarantine controls imposed by various governments will prevent seasonal workers from getting to farms where their labour is needed. As spring starts in America and Europe, farms are rushing to find enough workers to plant and harvest crops after border closures prevented the usual flow of foreign labourers. For instance, France has called on its own citizens to help offset an estimated shortfall of 200,000 workers.
As many aeroplanes are grounded, container ships anchored, ports shut down and borders closed, the entire global logistics chain for food has been disrupted for weeks and perhaps months, which has already triggered a shortfall in food supplies in China and many other countries.
Chinese supercomputer and US doctors clash over AI coronavirus diagnosis
Even as China gets the outbreak under control, the country’s farmers are still struggling to plant crops and to feed their livestock, as their supply of fertiliser or high-demand imports such as soybeans has been disrupted. These farmers have already suffered huge financial losses as their produce has not been transported to markets for sale in more than two months.
Consumers’ panic buying over fears of long-term logistics disruptions has exacerbated the situation, with supermarkets in many countries facing difficulty keeping food on shelves.
In response, some food-exporting countries have begun to limit the free flow of food and goods. For instance, Vietnam, the world’s third-largest exporter of rice, said it planned to stockpile the grain. Thailand has also banned shipments of chicken eggs to foreign nations after a domestic supply shortage.


The food-supply crisis could not have come at a worse time – locust swarms are now ravaging Africa and the Middle East, affecting food production there. The United Nations has warned that an imminent second hatch of the insects could threaten the food security of 25 million people across the region.
It would be a double blow for China, as the country is desperate to avoid further social unrest that could stem from prolonged food inflation. Due to the outbreak of African swine fever last year and the resulting supply disruption amid efforts to contain Covid-19, food prices in China jumped 21.4 per cent in February, largely driven by a 135.2 per cent hike in pork prices – the biggest increase on record. The swine fever reduced the nation’s pig herd by half, leaving many farmers penniless.
China can’t suppress it, US military can’t kill it. Covid-19 is the real Godzilla
Overall consumer prices rose a record 5.4 per cent in January and 5.2 per cent in February from the corresponding months last year. China’s ruling Communist Party has tried to keep consumer price increases below 3 per cent, seeing it as critical to maintaining social, economic and political stability.
Economists have warned that the food shortages and rising prices for staple crops are reminiscent of the food crises that shook developing nations a decade ago.
China is more vulnerable to disruptions in the fragile global food-supply chain as it depends heavily on imports for some crops. With 9.5 per cent of the world’s arable land and freshwater resources, China successfully feeds 22 per cent of the world’s population. It has achieved its strategic goal of becoming self-reliant in terms of its grain supply, with 95 per cent of wheat, rice and corn produced at home. China’s total grain output increased 74 per cent from 354 million tonnes in 1982 to 618 million tonnes in 2017, surpassing the growth of its population by about 34 per cent.

However, China relies on international markets for about 80 per cent of its consumed soybeans and agricultural staples such as milk and sugar. Though it is making great efforts in food logistics and agricultural industrialisation, it is still struggling to feed the growing appetite of its 1.4-billion population.
Coronavirus: for China, the economic pain has only just begun
Unlike the older generations who only had to worry about how to feed themselves, today’s Chinese want to eat more like their affluent counterparts in the developed world. For instance, China’s consumption of meat jumped from 7 million tonnes in 1975 to 75 million tonnes in 2017; the country now consumes roughly 50kg of meat per capita. The rising meat consumption also explains why China’s soybean imports – commonly used for animal feed – have increased exponentially, from 300,000 tonnes in 1995 to 95 million tonnes in 2017.

The Covid-19 pandemic has exposed the fragility of the global food supply chain. The vast size of China’s food production and consumption make its food supply and food safety issues a global concern, affecting markets, trade and investment around the world.
An international food crisis would not only have a significant economic impact, but also affect geopolitics. It would rekindle a debate among world leaders, politicians, policymakers and academics as well as investors and traders over a question posed by environmentalist Dr Lester R. Brown, the founder and former president of the Worldwatch Institute, in the title of his 1995 book: Who will feed China?
Between the trade war and coronavirus, US-China relations are becoming more toxic
The pandemic might serve as a wake-up call for China’s leaders – to the size of the gap between rising food demand and insufficient domestic supply, which has been exacerbated by both the massive conversion of arable land for urbanisation and industrialisation, and the people’s fast-growing and changing appetites. Historically, food security has played a crucial role not only in public health but also as a political issue in China. The memory still lingers of its great famine between the years 1959 and 1961, when widespread starvation is estimated to have killed tens of millions of people under Mao Zedong’s extreme leftist rule. ■
Cary Huang is a veteran China affairs columnist, having written on this topic since the early 1990s


Hong Kong’s Peninsula Hotels sees ‘bleisure’ boom after pandemic curbs, CEO says

US could require US$15,000 bonds for some tourist, business visas

China’s Shenzhen, Guangzhou airports hit record highs, surpass pre-Covid passenger levels

Landmark US Chinatown survived Covid, anti-Asian violence – but tariffs pose new threat

Coronavirus pandemic

As the coronavirus disrupts food supply chains, who will feed China?

A vendor at a pork stall at a market in Beijing, China. Photo: EPA

A woman wearing a face mask pays for vegetables over barriers set up to block buildings from a street in Wuhan, Hubei province, the epicentre of China's coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, April 1, 2020. REUTERS/Aly Song

FILE PHOTO: Pigs are seen in a pig farm in Bouille-Menard, France, April 28, 2017. REUTERS/Stephane Mahe/File Photo

epa08067161 An aerial photo made with a drone shows a farmer completing his soybean harvest in Lake Villa, Illinois, USA, 12 December 2019. The year has been particularly difficult on farmers with spring rains that delayed planting and an early onset of winter weather that has pushed the fall harvest into December for some farmers. EPA-EFE/TANNEN MAURY

Coronavirus has lit the fuse on a time bomb in China’s economy: debt

Pedestrians in Beijing. Photo: AFP

Coronavirus: China should stop unrealistic planning and start rescuing the economy

A worker in protective clothing passes a bag of food to a customer on the street outside a restaurant in Beijing. Photo: AFP

This Week in Asia

Opinion

Coronavirus

Analysis & Opinion


China’s rulers have long seen the stable and sufficient supply of food as the most critical issue in maintaining political, social and economic stability
With Covid-19 slowing down the production and movement of foodstuffs, the memory of the great famine of 1959-1961 lingers



China’s rulers have long seen the stable and sufficient supply of food as the most critical issue in maintaining political, social and economic stability.


Coronavirus pandemic: All stories

Coronavirus China

China food safety

China economy

China leadership

China pork crisis

Expresses the views, ideas and conclusions of the author. (Eg. Enough of Crazy Rich Asians, think of crazy poor Hongkongers.)


Column

Sino File