China is All-in as Beijing Calls Trump’s Hand

(PRINCETON, NJ) Last week Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue said a Chinese trade delegation would be visiting U.S. farms this week. Unfortunately, the group canceled the trip at the last minute claiming scheduling difficulties. The sudden change is putting a damper on hopes of a resolution in a soon to be a one-year-old trade war between the United States and China. In a brief statement on Friday, the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR) said discussions were productive, and the U.S. looks forward to welcoming a delegation from China for principal-level meetings next month. Dr. Cheng Xiaonong is the chief editor of the journal Modern China Studies and writes that cheap agricultural products cannot be imported from the U.S., so China will have to look to other markets for imports. However, the price of soybeans exported from Brazil has recently increased by 70 percent, and this includes soybeans imported by Brazil from the United States. Brazil, he explains, is taking advantage and making easy money, but this is greatly increasing prices in China. In the end, he says, China is going for broke in hopes that American consumers and farmers toss President Trump while ending the dispute. “The United States can no longer expect cooperative intent from China in resolving the trade deficit between the two sides nor on issues such as intellectual property theft”, Xiaonong concludes. “The only option Trump has left to reduce the U.S. trade deficit with China is to comprehensively and substantially increase tariffs on Chinese goods.”