The Massive ‘Pig Ebola’ Epidemic Will Give Trump Big Leverage In His Trade Standoff With China.
The terrible reality for the Chinese is that China is facing an unprecedented combination of agricultural challenges: Chinese pig Ebola (also known as African swine fever) and fall armyworm. These threats have already impacted Chinese agricultural production and will take an even greater toll in 2020.
Chinese pig Ebola is a severe and highly virulent disease nearly always fatal to hogs but purportedly harmless to humans. The virus moves effortlessly between pigs and can stay alive for great time and distances in feed, workers’ clothing, equipment, ticks, and mud. There is no vaccine nor cure. Previous outbreaks have been extremely destructive and difficult to control. According to the British Veterinary Association, CPE “is an acute viral hemorrhagic fever which, in domestic pigs and wild boar, results in case fatalities approaching 100 per cent.”
This particular outbreak of African swine fever has already proven to be the deadliest in world history. Christine McCracken, senior animal protein analyst for global lender Rabobank says, “It’s historic; there’s never been anything like this in the history of modern animal production. And it’s a frightening situation only in that there is no current control.”
200 million pigs (roughly half of China’s pig population and 25% of the global pig population) or more will die this year. Others (including Hayman) believe that to completely eradicate the disease, the entire Chinese pig herd may die this year. China’s Ministry of Agricultural and Rural Affairs reportedly claim a 20% reduction in the Chinese hog population, but various professional estimates have the decline closer to 40% with an even larger reduction in the sow population (down 80-90% in many provinces in China), which is a leading indicator of the level of Chinese pork output in coming months.
China is both the world’s largest producer and consumer of pork, at around 50% of the world’s pork supply and 20% of the world’s animal protein supply. The global cross-border trade in pork (i.e., total global exports) only constitute 15% of Chinese demand. If the worst-case scenarios come true and nearly the entire Chinese hog herd is affected, then China will need to import massive amounts of U.S. pork, regardless of the state of U.S.-China trade talks.
China Shifts Purchase Priorities From Manufacturing Materials to Food
An interesting article in the South China Morning Post (SCMP) highlights how China is shifting their procurement priority from minerals used in manufacturing (cobalt, copper) to the acquisition of food and agriculture products.
The impact is being felt throughout Africa, where mining companies are shutting down operations because Chinese demand no longer exists.
A country that cannot feed its own population even during the best of times, is now facing a downturn in economic and employment activity while the need to import food remains.
[…] analysts say that while countries that export cobalt, copper and iron ore will be hardest hit as Beijing – the major buyer of Africa’s hard commodities – diversifies the sourcing of its imports during the trade war, opportunities are opening up for exporters of soft commodities, such as agricultural products.
Add to all this the unrest in Hong Kong, a center in China of banking and finance. The Communists could militarily crush Hong Kong, but they would just as certainly crush the economy there, along with all its benefits to the mainland. Right now, the food crisis and the trade war with Trump raises the risks of using violence in Hong Kong far higher than it would be in normal times.
Do the totalitarian leaders of Red China have the intellectual agility to deal with these converging crises? Or are they a pack of ham handed, thick headed party hacks sorely lacking the imagination and intelligence required to survive this confluence of problems?
I repeat my theory that, like the late Soviet Union, Red China is a very brittle society, with the totalitarian government, Communist in name only, holding on to power purely through brute military force. The deal they cut with the Chinese people is that the government would allow the people to use capitalistic means to get rich, and keep that wealth, in return for not challenging the legitimacy of the government.
Should that bargain fall apart due to the trade war/food crisis/destruction of Hong Kong, then we could conceivably see a sudden collapse of the Communist regime there just as happened so suddenly and unexpectedly to the Soviet Union.
Just as President Reagan, vilified and spit on by the left, was able to destroy our main global enemy without firing a shot by pressing them so hard economically that they broke, President Trump may accomplish the same thing, although all he really wants is a fair deal between the two countries.
Bring the popcorn, this is just getting more and more interesting.
You never know when they'll deliberately send the disease here out of revenge.
ReplyDeleteSome Theorists and Conspiracy Hacks think the resulting crash and upheaval in China could set a "Red Dawn" scenario up. Popcorn and Beer Futures skyrocket...
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI hope they get a handle on that, a world without pork would not be a good one! As to China not having enough food, there is more than one way for them to deal with that.
ReplyDeleteI had a "Swine Flu" shot in 1976. I wonder if it's still good?
ReplyDeleteGorges Smythe, that was my first thought.
ReplyDeleteIf we could send them our feral hogs, that would solve both our problems.
Traditionally when "The Winds Of Heaven" change, society breaks down and the result is bloodbaths. My biggest concern is internal nuclear war.
ReplyDeleteWait for the word of food riots leaking from the interior. The army worm is what is going to make them starve. Add in the slight disaster that is shaping up for our own corn and soybean harvest this fall and it might get a little sporty if we don't have the usual surplus to help feed the world. And one other little thing, expect Sally Struthers on TV asking for money to feed the little children in central Africa. The Chinese have been propping up economies in central Africa for a decade now. No support, no food purchases by indigenous peoples. We are on the cusp of a worldwide catastrophe of biblical proportions. Throw in the fact that South African farmers used to feed a lot of the continent but no longer do as the SA government has the SA farmer on the endangered species list. Also say good bye to the rebound in the wild animal population as the locals eat them, poaching be damned.
ReplyDeleteSpin
"Pig Ebola"could easily be one the next pandemic for humans.
ReplyDelete