US beef gets hit on the Chinese market, France is regaining access
China is probably the most disputed market for beef at this time since the US industry expects a decline in sales just after one year from the come back into this market and EU member states are starting to resume their exports to the Chinese market.
The U.S. beef industry has made progress in establishing a customer base in China, but is about to face a steep challenge from 6th of July – an additional 25 percent retaliatory tariff, which will raise China’s total import duty rate on U.S. beef to 37 percent, says Joel Haggard, US Meat Export Federation (USMEF) senior vice president for the Asia Pacific.
Only the announcement of new duties imposed on American beef has taken its toll, as Haggard admitted on an audio report for USMEF.
"The threat of duties has caused a noticeable slowdown in both US beef importing activity but also, more importantly, a slowdown in the interest by some of our loyal restaurant and retail partners", declared Joel Haggard. In his opinion, the Chinese partners are worried about the consumer reaction if the trade war escalates further. There's no chance that US exporters will reduce the price to match the duties as long as there are alternative markets for beef, considers Haggard. He expects the volume entering China to decline once the higher duty rate takes effect and consider this to be "regrettable".
Meantime, France has announced that it concluded the discussion regarding the access for beef into China, on 25 June leaders of both governments signed an agreement on this. French beef will be back on the Chinese market after 17 years of absence, following the road opened in May by Ireland. "We already have contacts with various Chinese importers who are on standby", commented Dominique Langlois, president of Interbev. He added that French exporters are targeting a volume of 30,000 tonnes per year.
In the second half of 2017, following the reopening of the market, U.S. beef exports to China totalled about 3,000 tonnes valued at $31 million. Through April of this year, exports were just under 2,300 tonnes valued at $21.3 million. In present, China imports beef from 14 countries around the world.
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