Soybean in China: Adaptating to the Liberalization
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
OCL 2016, 23(6) D604 c J.-P. Jamet and J.-M. Chaumet, Published by EDP Sciences 2016 OCL DOI: 10.1051/ocl/2016044 Oilseeds & fats Crops and Lipids Available online at: www.ocl-journal.org Research Article –Dossier Open Access OIL CROPS AND SUPPLY CHAIN IN ASIA Lafiliere` oleagineuse´ en Asie Soybean in China: adaptating to the liberalization Jean-Paul Jamet1 and Jean-Marc Chaumet2, 1 Membre de l’Académie de l’agriculture de France, 18 rue de Bellechasse, 75007 Paris, France 2 Département économie de l’Institut de l’Elevage, 149 rue de Bercy, 75595 Paris Cedex 12, France ossier Received 18 July 2016 – Accepted 14 October 2016 D Abstract – Since 1978 and its opening, China has undergone a process of nutrition transition, animal products taking an increasing share. Anxious to ensure a certain level of food independence, Chinese authorities have developed national livestock production. The increase in volumes and the development of large scale breeding have increased the demand for commercial feed and thus soymeal. Meanwhile, edible oil consumption rose sharply, accentuating the demand for soybeans. To meet this demand, soybean imports were liberalized early, leading the country to become heavily dependent. China has indeed made the choice to maintain its independence in cereals at the expense of other grains, such as soybeans. Competition between corn and soybeans has turned in favor of the cereal, soybean production levelling off then regressing. China’s dependence extends to the crushing sector, controlled by foreign companies. Public supports in place, such as minimum prices, have resulted in increasing the price gap with imported products, leading to a reform of soybean policy in 2014. Keywords: China / soybean / import / soymeal / edible oil / crushing Résumé – Le soja en Chine : l’adapation à la libéralisation. Depuis 1978 et l’ouverture de la Chine, l’alimentation de la population de la population chinoise s’est considérablement modifiée, les produits animaux prenant une part croissante. Soucieux de garantir un certain niveau d’indépendance alimentaire, les autorités chinoises ont développé les productions animales sur leur sol. La progression des volumes ainsi que la transformation des modes d’élevages ont accru la demande en alimentation animale commercialisée et donc en tourteau de soja. Parallèlement, la consommation humaine d’huile a fortement progressé, accentuant la demande en graine de soja. Pour satisfaire cette demande, les importations de soja ont été très tôt libéralisées, conduisant le pays à devenir fortement dépendant. La Chine a en effet fait le choix de chercher à conserver son indépendance en céréales aux dépens d’autres grains, comme le soja. La compétition entre le maïs et le soja a donc tourné à l’avantage de la céréale, la production de soja plafonnant puis régressant. La dépendance de la Chine s’étend jusque dans la trituration, celle-ci étant passée aux mains d’entreprises étrangères. Les soutiens mis en place, comme le prix minimum, n’ont eu comme conséquence que d’accroître l’écart de prix avec les produits importés, menant en 2014 à une réforme de la politique du soja. Mots clés : Chine / soja / importations / tourteau / huile alimentaire / trituration Chinese rulers have always paid great attention to agricultural of the 1960’s imports of cereals, especially wheat, gained mo- production. Grains (mainly cereals but also soybean and tu- mentum as Chinese agriculture was unable to produce enough bers) were considered as the source of the country’s power grain. Liberalization of agriculture in the early 80’s reversed and wealth. Lack of food has almost always been one of the the trend and China exported corn and wheat at the end of the reasons explaining the fall of dynasties. 1980’s. Until the 20th century, China relied on its own resources to But the steady economic growth that distinguishes China feed its population. Only imports of rice occasionally occurred since the 90’s has brought change in the lifestyle of many in the south of the country in the 19th century. Self-reliance Chinese households. Looking at the demography, the rise in was also the general philosophy of Mao Zedong; imports were living standards and agri-food foreign trade, it seems that the limited until the Great Leap Forward. Starting the beginning Chinese economy is moving further away from achieving the self-sufficiency objective. Chinese agricultural production is Correspondence: [email protected] clearly struggling to satisfy the increase in demand, whether This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. J.-P. Jamet and J.-M. Chaumet: OCL 2016, 23(6) D604 it emanates from consumers or livestock farmers. After the years ago. Van et al.(2008) looked at evolutionary events, re- year 2003, the trade balance tipped into long-term deficit, vealing the recent divergence of two soybean homologous re- in contrast with the high surpluses achieved in manufactured gions occurred at 60 and 12 million years ago, respectively. goods trading. Clarindo et al.(2007) found that the karyograms support With its high level of imports, Chinese soybean sector is soybean’s tetraploid nature (4x = 40), specifically for the the symbol of this food dependency, a new era in Chinese presence of chromosomes with identical morphology and sug- history. gested that chromosome rearrangements may have occurred during the speciation of G max, the wild soybean was domes- ticated by ancient people under certain agricultural conditions. 1 Origin and domestication of soybean The first piece of evidence is that the number of chromo- in China somes is both the cultivated soybean and the wild soybean is 2n = 40. The chromosome set in GG, if we cross the cultivated Because China has a long history of growing soybean and soybean with the wild soybean, the fertility and the seed – set- a rich array, soybean germplasm has been bred through long- ting percentage of the F1 generation are normal and there is term natural and artificial selection, this provides a rich base no obvious difference as compared to crosses with cultivated for the selection and breeding of soybean varieties and for soybeans. This shows that there is no isolation between the making a great contribution to soybean production and breed- cultivated soybean and the wild soybean and they are (at the ing in the world. very least) close relatives. China has made extensive improvements in soybean vari- The second piece of evidence is that when the cultivated eties and the high-yield culture techniques of soybean continue soybean is crossed with the wild soybean, the seed size, plant to improve. There is still, great potential for further improve- height, lodging and other traits are inherited as quantitative ments in soybean yield. traits, with some intermediate types occurring, which show The genus Glycine wild is divided in two subgenera that the two groups accumulated minor variants of the under- Glycine perenials and Glycine soja. lying genes. Third, new variations have been identified in late-maturing variants with large seeds and thick stems are also minor varia- 1.1 Distribution of annual wild soybean tions of quantitative traits. The fourth piece of evidence is that among the rich Taxonomically both the annual wild soybean (Gsoja)and germplasm resources in China, there are wild soybeans, semi cultivated soybean (GMaxL) are subgenera of soja. wild soybeans and highly evolved cultivated soybeans. The distribution of wild soybean in China is extensive. People mainly use soybeans seeds. In long-term produc- Fukuda (1933) a Japanese scholar thought that the origin of tion activity and use, people have focused on selection of large soybean is North-East China, based on the observation that seeds. While the seed of soybean has been enlarged, corre- the semi natural wild soybeans are extensively distributed in spondingly the pod has been enlarged, the plant height reduced North-East China, but not in the other regions, that there are and the stem thickened. Reductions in plant height have been many soybean varieties in this region and that many of them favorable for development from wine type to vertical type. The possess “original” characteristics (Qiu and Chang, 2010). vertical type plant is easy to manage and good management In fact, many small black soybean germplasms have “prim- conditions have promoted the selection of strong and lodging- itive” traits. They are extensively distributed in the lower resistant types. and middle reaches of the Yellow River; especially in North Shaanxi and North Shanxi provinces. Therefore, their distri- bution area is much larger than North-East China alone (Qiu and Chang, 2010). 1.2 Distribution across the provinces Maliao Dou and Nidou (GMaxL) which are closely re- lated to semi natural soybean are distributed even as far South In China, three growing regions can be distinguished, ac- as the Yangtze River Valley. Fukuda indicated that the num- cording to the cropping system. The North-East Spring-sowing ber of soybean varieties in this area is very large and that soybean region is the largest soybean-producing region in Shaanxi and Shanxi provinces alone have 3000 accessions of China. This region includes Heilongjiang, Jilin, Liaoning and soybean germplasm resources. As well as these Spring-type the greater part of Inner Mongolia (see Fig. 1). Soybean is soybeans, the number of varieties of summer planting types in sown in Spring (the last ten days of April and the first ten days the Yangtze River Valley is also developing considerably. of May) and harvested in Autumn (from the middle ten days The genus Glycine is thought to be of ancient polyploid to the last ten days of September).