– Adam Townsend
This thread explains China’s tech-theft, its food supply and its pollution. CFIUS (Committee on Foreign investment in the US) is made up of 32 different federal agencies that review foreign purchases that could affect U.S. security such as access to technology, military contracts, installations or other sensitive information. Agriculture isn’t part of the CFIUS mandate nor is the USDA or FDA.
The committee isn’t required to review any deals, relying instead on outsiders or other government agencies to raise questions about the appropriateness of a proposed transaction. The most common foreign investor that hits the CFIUS radar is China. Let’s peel that onion.
President Obama stopped a Chinese investment fund from acquiring the U.S. subsidiary of a German semiconductor manufacturer. In September 2017, Trump halted a China-backed investor from buying the American semiconductor maker Lattice. A Chinese company’s plan to acquire the American money transfer company MoneyGram fell apart after CFIUS expressed their concerns that the personal data of millions of Americans would be exposed.
CFIUS advised against a Chinese group’s attempt to buy Xcerra, a Massachusetts HQ’ed tech company. Trump blocked the purchase of the chipmaker Qualcomm by Singapore-based Broadcom Ltd. on the advice of CFIUS.
Unprecedented Environment Pollution by China
Only about 11 percent of Chinese land can be farmed. Most of its tremendous land mass is inarable, degraded by erosion, salinization, acidification, industrial effluent, sewage, excessive farm chemicals and mining runoff. Chinese rivers have been drying as demand from farms and factories have depleted them. Of the ones that remain, 75 percent are severely polluted, and more than a third of those are so toxic they can’t be used to irrigate farms.
In reagrds to food supply, Chinese authorities have encouraged companies to gain greater control over the entire supply chain for imported agricultural products. China’s average annual water resources are less than 2,200 cubic meters per capita. The United States, by contrast is about 9,400 cubic meters of water per person.
The United States has six times more arable land per capita Pork. The Chinese currently eat 88 pounds per capita annually (Americans eat 60 pounds). They produce and consume half of the world’s pork, so when there are fluctuations in their domestic production – even small fluctuations – it can really increase their need for imports.
To meet the growing demand, China’s hog farms have grown and multiplied, and more than half of the globe’s pigs are now raised there. But even so, its production can’t keep up with the pork demand. US pork exports to China went from about 57,000 metric tons in 2003 to more than 2.31 million metric tons (mt) in 2016 which converts to $5.94 billion. It’s cheaper to produce pork in the US than in China.
Buyout of US meat Industry by Chinese firms
US meat industry churns out hogs for about $0.57 per pound, versus $0.68 per pound in China’s new, factory-scale hog farms. The main difference is feed costs. US pig producers spend about 25% less on feed than their Chinese counterparts. We have more abundant land, water and grain resources.
So, China buys Smithfield Pork. In an effort to cut out the middleman, China is trying to circumvent the American farmer. Instead of buying food from farmers who work their own land, they want to own and operate these American farms themselves—as well as the livestock barns and slaughterhouses. Chinese consumers, pay a large premium for US pork as it is viewed as higher quality due to our strict food safety laws.
“Control oil and you control nations; control food and you control the people.”
A Chinese meat-processing company in 2013, purchased Smithfield for 30 percent over its market value. It was the largest purchase of a U.S. company by a Chinese firm and the first acquisition of a major American food company by a Chinese business. U.S. Treasury Department allowed the purchase to go forward after assurances from Smithfield CEO Larry Pope that there was no connection between Shaunghui and the Chinese government. A year later it was discovered that the Chinese government did have a connection to Shaunghui.
The Communist Party supported the Smithfield purchase with “preferential policy”, as well as “investment,” Zhang Taixi, the government-appointed president of WH Group (the corporate name Shaunghui adopted in 2014), told reporters! The WH Group advanced the China Communist Party aims to own the entire production chain for pork with the least geographic distance between U.S. pork production and the Chinese market.
Absolute Control by Chinese companies backed by CCP
One of the benefits to owning every aspect of production from feed through packaging is that you can increase production on demand.
ChemChina, a China Communist Party owned company, recently bought Syngenta, a Swiss agrichemical company, for 43 billion dollars, and this creates a bigly foothold in feed production.
What if the Chinese government becomes of the largest players in American agriculture. We’ve handed over a vertically integrated system to a foreign government. Side effect of that is the damage left in its wake, production leads to more barns being built and, in turn, waste coming out of those barns. You need more feed for those pigs, so you’re raising more row crops and putting more of that waste onto the fields.
Between 2007 and 2012, Iowa had the largest increase in hog and pig sales of any state in the country, a jump of $1.9 billion. The number of polluted Iowan waterways increased 15 percent between 2012 and 2014. Not only do the waste pits used to capture manure from large hog operations produce antibiotic-resistant bacteria, the pathogens can travel miles away. When a foreign investor buys land, local population loses farming rights, which can lead to people losing their homes, livelihoods, and access to resources like water.
In order to preserve its well-being, Iowa outlawed selling farmland to foreign buyers. The median age of the American farmer is 55, in the next five years about 92,000,000 acres will go up for sale.
(The article is a compilation of the thread by the author)
