By a wide margin, soybeans are the most valuable U.S. farm export, accounting for 18 cents of every $1 in sales during calendar 2020, said the USDA’s Foreign Agricultural Service on Wednesday. Corn, the country’s most widely grown crop, was second in export value to soybeans, which were worth a record $25.7 billion compared with $9.2 billion for corn.
Exports totaled $145.7 billion, the second highest for a calendar year and up 7 percent from 2019. “The primary factor for this surge in exports was increased shipments of soybeans, corn, and pork to China,” said the Agricultural Export Yearbook. Soybean exports were up 38 percent from the preceding year.
China, the world’s largest food and ag importer, was the No. 1 market for U.S. agricultural exports. It bought $26.4 billion worth of them in 2020, roughly double the $13.9 billion of 2019. Purchases included $14.1 billion worth of soybeans followed by $2.3 billion worth of pork, $1.8 billion worth of cotton, and $1.2 billion worth of corn. The United States and China de-escalated their trade war in early 2020.