China's corn and biofuel policies and agricultural trade: Projections from an international agricultural commodity market model

Abstract

We calibrate the Center for Agricultural and Rural Development International Agricultural Commodity Market model using 2019/20 marketing year crop data and 2020 calendar year livestock and biofuel data to project China's agricultural imports under six plausible policy scenarios focusing on ethanol, corn, and pork from 2021 to 2030. Our baseline projection reflects China's current policy of relaxing the tariff rate quota (TRQ) for corn and imposing ethanol tariff without any ethanol/gasoline blend mandate. Baseline projections show China's ethanol imports grow from 100 million liters in 2020 to 1.21 billion liters in 2030; however, they also show that China's corn and pork imports remain at high levels and peak in the 2022/23 marketing year.