Leaders of the National Pork Producers Council appealed to China to remove its 60 percent tariff on imports of U.S. pork so it can bring down the soaring price of pork for Chinese consumers. The highly contagious African swine fever has killed one-third of the pigs in China, where pork is the most widely consumed meat by far.
“We could help mitigate their losses,” said NPPC president David Herring during a luncheon with reporters. “We would like the opportunity.” The NPPC’s vice president for government affairs, Nick Giordano, said China “obviously is going to import more pork. The question is who is going to benefit.”
Before the Sino-U.S. trade war, China imported about $1 billion a year of U.S. pork. Sales have nearly dried up because of retaliatory tariffs. U.S. farmers are losing $8 per hog because of the tariffs, said the NPPC. The USDA said China bought 10,878 tonnes of U.S. pork last week, the largest one-week total since May. Roughly one-fourth of U.S. pork is exported.
At the luncheon, when asked about plant-based meat alternatives, Herring held up a hand-drawn picture of a pig with the legend “plant-based protein.” Dan Kovich, the NPPC’s director of science, said the USDA would probably classify cell-based meat as a “meat food product” under its rules on meat nomenclature. “We don’t see any way … it is just called pork.”