Speech by Ambassador Qin Gang at the Opening of the China-U.S. Agricultural Roundtable

Ladies and Gentlemen,
Friends,

I would like to send warm congratulations to the opening of China-U.S. Agricultural Roundtable. I also express my thanks to the Chinese People's Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries and the U.S. Heartland China Association for your longstanding efforts for the sub-national cooperation and friendly exchanges between China and the U.S.

Both China and the U.S. are major agricultural producers and consumers. The U.S. is also the world's largest exporter of agricultural products, while China is the biggest importer. As a highlight of China-U.S. pragmatic cooperation, agricultural cooperation is well-grounded and highly-complementary between our two countries. Since the phase-one trade deal was signed in 2020, China has been faithfully fulfilling the agricultural procurement commitment. 

As a result, our agricultural trade registered a quick comeback from the pandemic and trade frictions, and rose to 46.54 billion dollars in 2021, with China’s imports reaching 39.02 billion dollars, up by 64.2% year on year. China now takes up one-fifth of US agricultural exports, more than any other country or region, enabling America’s record-breaking agricultural exports last year. 

Last year, each American farmer exported more than 11,000 dollars of agricultural products to China on average. Agricultural cooperation best explains the win-win nature of our economic and trade relations. It also speaks to our highly complementary economic structures and deeply intertwined interests.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Agriculture is an important part of the friendly cooperation between China and the U.S. As our agricultural production increasingly face the restraints from population, resources and the environment, and COVID-19 and climate change poses new challenges to global food security, deeper agricultural cooperation will not only benefit both countries’ agriculture and people, but also carry strong significance to global food security and agricultural development. 

As a Chinese saying goes, "the whole year's work depends on a good start in spring."As we fully embrace the spring, I hope you will take today’s opportunity to share ideas on the innovative development and win-win cooperation of agriculture, so as to find new opportunities and inject new impetus to the sound and stable development of China-U.S. relations!

Thank you.

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