From the St, Louis Post-Dispatch:
Chinese-owned pork producer will sell at least $240,000 worth of ham products to the federal government as part of President Donald Trump's farm bailout program, the administration said Wednesday.U.S. pork producer Smithfield Foods, which is owned by the Chinese conglomerate WH Group, will sell 144,000 pounds worth of ham products to the federal government under the contract.
The Agriculture Department is purchasing pork and other commodities from U.S. farmers to help offset the damages from retaliatory tariffs imposed by China this summer. The administration has pitched the relief as a necessary short-term measure to help farmers weather the trade battle.
The Agriculture Department announced about $7.5 million worth of awards under the purchase program on Wednesday, according to an awards notice released by the department's Agricultural Marketing Service.
Smithfield could receive more taxpayer dollars in subsequent round of the purchasing program.......MORE
*April 24: "China and Pigs and Soybeans: It's Complicated"
March 3: "China Unveils How It Will Retaliate To US Tariffs, USDJPY Snaps"
If I was a pig in the Midwest I'd be tempted to vote for Donald Trump in 2020.
And I'm not talking deplorables.
As my favorite translator of Mandarin tells me, Chinese people love pork.
And we've been babbling on about China's Strategic Pork Reserve for over a decade. Here's 2010's '"...Pork Signals Record Meat Prices' and China's Strategic Pork Reserve (SFD)":
I just threw Smithfield's symbol into the headline, neither story directly mention's the country's largest hog and pork producer. We first mentioned the Strategic Pork Reserve in an October 2007 post "Is China Going to Own the World?".
As it turned out, Smithfield was purchased by China's largest protein processor, Shuanghui International Holdings (now WH Group), in 2013 in a move that triggered a national security review in the U.S., I kid you not,
Anyhoo, China has been playing power politics for something like 5000
years and should President Trump go through with the threatened tariffs
the Chinese will strike directly at his base while the porkers breathe a
little easier as a major export market is taken off the table, so to
speak....
Pork prices, with the exception of 2014 have been trading between $60 and $100 for a decade.In 2014 you had the American bacon binge (2011 - 2014) combined with porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PED).
When it was realized PED was not as deadly as rumored/feared (but still quite messy) prices came back down.
And many more, use the 'search blog' box if interested.
Pork prices, with the exception of 2014 have been trading between $60 and $100 for a decade.In 2014 you had the American bacon binge (2011 - 2014) combined with porcine epidemic diarrhea virus (PED).
When it was realized PED was not as deadly as rumored/feared (but still quite messy) prices came back down.
And many more, use the 'search blog' box if interested.
