As Brazil takes a greater share of Chinese soybean purchases away from American farmers, the US is trying to win back buyers by emphasizing crop quality, as reported by CNBC.
“Soybean production in North America and soybean production in South America is very different,” Carlos Salinas, Executive Director, East Asia, at the US Soybean Export Council (USSEC) said in a presentation recently at the China International Supply Chain Expo in Beijing.
He compared a range of weather factors between a city in Brazil and one in the US state of Illinois, such as rainfall in the 30 days ahead of harvest: 231 millimeters versus 72 mm.
“That impacts crop condition. That impacts quality,” he said.
The half-day event for “advancing a sustainable and resilient US-China soybean supply chain” was co-organized with the China Council for the Promotion of International Trade.
“What we really encourage buyers in soy to do is to make sure they’re educating themselves on this to go deeper,” Jim Sutter, USSEC CEO, noting new ways to measure quality and nutrition, especially for animal feed.
American soybeans have become a bargaining chip in the escalation of US-China trade tensions over the last several years. Beijing, the world’s largest soybean importer, has also diversified its sourcing to Brazil and Argentina in an effort to ensure food security.
While the US and Brazil each accounted for around 40% of China’s soybean imports a decade ago, Brazil started to take a far larger share in 2018 after the first round of US tariffs on China, according CNBC calculations of Chinese customs data accessed through Wind Information.
As of the first five months of 2026, more than 60% of China’s soybean imports came from Brazil, 23% from the US and 10% from Argentina, the data showed.
US soybean exports to China plunged 76% last year to USD 3.1 billion, down sharply from a peak of USD 17.9 billion in 2022, according to official US figures. At 7.37 million tons, US soybeans remained the largest American agricultural export to China during the last calendar year.
Convincing Chinese buyers to ramp up purchases will take time.
In May 2026, the White House said China would buy at least USD 17 billion of US agricultural goods annually through 2028, following US President Donald Trump’s meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing. That amount would be “in addition to the soybean purchase commitments that it made in October 2025.”
After a Trump-Xi meeting in South Korea last fall, the US said China agreed to buy at least 25 million tons of American soybeans in each of the following three years.
China has bought all 12 million tons of American soybeans that it agreed to purchase in the marketing year ending August 2026, and almost all of that has been shipped, Mr Sutter said.
As for the subsequent 25 million tons, he said purchases began last week (mid of June 2026).
On June 17 and 18, the US Department of Agriculture said private exporters reported sales of 132,000 tons of soybeans for delivery to China in the marketing year ending August 31, 2027, as well as sales of far more soybeans to unknown destinations spread over two years. Mr Sutter noted such unknown destinations often turn out to be China.
There are further signs of a modest pickup.
“In the last week and a half, the Chinese have committed to buy nearly a million tons of crop we’ll start harvesting this September,” Jerry Slocum, Director of the United Soybean Board and a Mississippi farmer, told CNBC.
“So, we’re seeing the agreement that the two presidents made, we’re seeing it come to fruition,” Mr Slocum said.
Despite the optimism, US soybeans likely will not be flooding back into China anytime soon.
Mr Sutter said he expected export volumes to hover around 25 million to 30 million tons for the next year or two, before potentially climbing toward 40 million tons in subsequent years.