Farmers in the top corn-growing province of China say they will shift land to soybeans or other crops now that the government is reducing the support price for corn. The decision to allow the market to set the price for corn “should transform the agricultural landscape,” says Reuters, with larger plantings of more profitable crops such as rice, peanuts and soybeans. A side effect would be less demand for imports of soybeans, such as for livestock rations, making vegetable oil and as an ingredient in processed foods.
Analysts and traders expect China to grow an additional 2 million tonnes of soybeans this year, with larger increases in the future, said Reuters.
China is small beans as a soybean grower. Its crop totaled 12 million tonnes, less than 4 percent of world production of 320 million tonnes in 2015, according to the USDA, which forecasts China will import 82 million tonnes of the oilseed this marketing year. Two-thirds of the soybeans on the world market are shipped to China.