| In the international trade of agricultural products, soybean is a versatile strategic crop. Firstly, as one of the essential grain crops, soybean, with rice, corn and wheat together, constitute the four major grain crops in China. From the nutritional sense, protein content of soybean is considered to be optimal protein required by people and attracts the world's attention. Secondly, as one of soybean products after crushing, soybean oil belongs to the chief source of edible oil. Thirdly, as another crushing product, soybean meal is rich in vegetable protein which is a vital ingredient of feed. Fourthly, as legumes, soybean is part of ecological crop, which functions in biological nitrogen fixation and plays a predominant role in the global nitrogen cycle. Therefore, we can conclude that China's soybean industry is a strategic industry. To begin with, the chain of soybean industry is very long and wide which starts from soybean plantation industry and expands to traditional soybean food processing industry, soybean oil processing industry and the emerging soybean intensive processing industries. Next, there is strong demand in China, with wide market prospects and sustainable development. Finally, China's soybean industry will also be helpful to resolve the "three rural" issues. The development of China's soybean industry can promote the employment rate of the peasants, and accelerate the income levels in soybean farming and aquaculture industry, and enhance the comparative advantage in the main harvested areas and strategic adjustment of agricultural structure. It is also conducive to agriculture, rural economic and social development.With more than five thousand years'history of soybean cultivation and consumption, China is the soybean origin recognized by the world. Soybean plantation spreads almost all over the country. In the 1930s, China was the world's largest soybean producer, with more than 90% average annual share of world total output. As a result of slow development in the 1990s, China's soybean production had lag behind of the level in U.S., Brazil and Argentina. At the same period, domestic demand to soybean roared sharply. As the growth speed of domestic soybean demand was pretty faster than the growth speed of production, China had to choose importing soybeans to fill in the gap. China became a net importer of soybean in 1996. Since then, the importing volume was climbing all the way. According to the custom statistics, China's soybean imports settled at a historical high of 42.55 million tons in 2009. It has seriously hindered the development of China's soybean industry. The international competitiveness of China's soybean industry also has been dropping down accordingly. For instance, with large quantities of imports, China has not gained the pricing power in the global soybean market. In the opposite, the China factor always becomes the object of speculation. Given the current situation, it is a top priority to strengthen the international competitiveness of China's soybean industry. It can promote China's soybean industry, and enhance China's economic progress which is the main purposes of the research.The research is divided into five chapters. The first chapter introduces the research purpose and significance, background, literature review, supporting theories and research structure and method.The second chapter describes the pattern of world soybean industry from the perspective of soybean production, trade, consumption and processing. Concerning world soybean production, the predominant soybean planting countries shift from U.S. and China to U.S. Brazil and Argentina. Recently, the total soybean production in U.S., Brazil and Argentina accounts for more than 75% of the world's soybean production. Although China was the soybean origin and its total output accounted for 90% of the world production in the 1930s, China's soybean production has been developing in a slow pace later, and its annual output has already been lower than the level in U.S., Brazil and Argentina in the 1990s. The output proportion in the world production has declined to 7% in recent years. Concerning world soybean exports, the primary exporting countries change from U.S. and China to U.S., Brazil and Argentina. Compared with the export pattern, the distribution of world soybean importing countries is quite scattered. Leading soybean importing countries centralize in China, EU, Japan and Mexico. Before 1995, China was a part of traditional soybean exporting countries. After converting to a net soybean importer in 1996, China's soybean imports behaves an increasing trend year by year, has exceeded the importing volume of EU in 2003 and become the largest soybean importer in the world. As China's traditional soybean belongs to none genetically modified organism, there is still a small amount of soybean exports in China. World soybean consumption can be divided into feed consumption, seed consumption, processing consumption, food consumption and other purposes. The ruling consumption countries concentrate in U.S., Brazil, Argentina, China and the EU. China's soybean consumption is based on oil extraction and edible consumption. With the opening up of China's oil and oilseed market, edible oil consumption has entered a period of rapid growth. With the awareness of people's health and nutrition, the world's soybean processing industry has developed rapidly. The organizational structure of world processing industry is mainly guided by multinational corporations including ADM, Bunge, Cargill, and Louis Dreyfus. These corporations control more than 70% of global soybean supply. Chinese soybean processing enterprises have gained a fast expansion recently, and centralize in coastal districts.The third chapter analyzes the impacting factors of the international competitiveness in soybean industry. Firstly, cost and price are the predominant factors. Studies have shown that production cost of soybean harvested areas in China is lower than the level in U.S., but U.S. covers the shortage with its cheaper trading and transporting charges. In addition, soybean export price in China is higher than the level in U.S., Argentina and Brazil, and also higher than the average level in the world. Secondly, in the list of none genetically modified soybean producers, China has a strong competitive advantage with quality in the international market. In soybean industry, yield is an index measuring productive efficiency. By comparison, the yield of China's soybean industry drops behind of the average level in the world. Thirdly, the basic environmental factors also affect the soybean industry's international competitiveness. The climate and soil conditions in northeast of China are fully suitable for soybean cultivation, but there are less investment in agricultural science and technology. Regarding the distribution infrastructure in China, the transportation and communications have been developing fast in the current. But there is still a distance to catch up with the world advanced level. Fourthly, soybean trade policies are made up of an essential element in the impacting factors of international competitiveness. With accession to WTO, China has basically implemented a 3% soybean import tariff system, with a significant tendency to encourage imports of soybeans, which is not conducive to the domestic soybean production. But in 2002, the Chinese Ministry of Agriculture promulgated the Measures for the Administration of Agricultural Genetically Modified organisms. The management practices tighten the controls on soybean imports and exports; widen the price difference between genetically modified soybean and traditional soybean; enhance the production and export of domestically traditional soybean. At the same time, there are some drawbacks, such as the implementation of opaque regulations and possibility to cause international trade disputes.The fourth chapter, as the focus of the research, proposes countermeasures to strengthen the international competitiveness of Chinese soybean industry. To begin with, we must vigorously promote domestic soybean production. Firstly, it is unrealistic to enhance the soybean production merely by enlarging the planting areas under the tight situation of domestic arable land resources. The correct approach should be to improve the yield. The concrete measures include the rational use of fine varieties, the enhancement of planting techniques and the improvement of irrigation infrastructure. Secondly, we must reduce the production cost by the way of encouraging large-scale and standardized production, popularizing the advanced production technologies and lowering down the distribution costs. Thirdly, different from GM soybeans, China's traditional non-GM soybeans are rich in protein and precious soy isoflavones. We should take advantage of the quality, support the traditional soybean production and foster a green brand for non-GM soybeans. For the next, we must sharpen the pricing power in the international market. First, to develop and improve domestic futures market is an important method to get pricing power. In the international soybean sales contract, the pricing term is calculated on the basis of futures price. Chicago Board of Trade is the futures pricing center of genetically modified soybean in the worldwide. By improving the development of Dalian Commodity of Exchange, we could expand the effect of domestic futures market on the international soybean prices. Second, we should set limits on the foreign investments. Whether developed or developing countries, they all limit the foreign investment especially in soybean industry concerning a country's economic security. In this way, the government could ensure the ownership and absolute control of the industry. Third, we should build up agricultural information platform. The special information organization should pay close attention to the trends in domestic and international grain markets and provide immediate information to domestic soybean growers and traders. Then, we should regulate imports of soybeans. On one hand, domestic soybean demand must be firstly met by domestic soybean production, and in part by imports to fill the gap. The reason is to protect the interest.of peasant in soybean major harvested areas. In addition, as China's soybean industry is a strategic industry, the initiative of a national strategic industry should not be mastered in the hands of others. Moreover, soybean has become a critical material in international agricultural trade. If the satisfaction of domestic soybean demand completely relies on imports, we are bound to be in a passive position controlled by others in the international trade. On the other hand, we had better to choose importing soybean instead of soybean oil under tariff reduction. No matter importing soybean or soybean oil, the impact on domestic soybean oil supply is the same. The choice of importing soybean could bring benefits in many aspects such as meeting domestic demand for soybean meal, enhancing the development in processing industry, feed industry and aquaculture, and providing more job opportunities. What's more, it is favorable for the state, society and business to import raw material used in deep processing instead of manufactured goods. Finally, we need to make efforts to enhance the government's support and guidance. For one thing, by drawing the experience from U.S. and Brazil, the Chinese government should enlarge the subsidy scope and variety in order to encourage the soybean production. For another, the government should support and encourage the soybean growers and traders to set up cooperative organizations of production, sales and purchase.The fifth chapter is the conclusion of the research. The current situation faced by China's soybean industry is both an opportunity and a challenge. Effective measures can promote the development of China's soybean industry and strengthen the international competitiveness of China's soybean industry.Because the time, data, and resources are limited, this research focused primarily on the analysis of the international competitiveness of China's soybean industry, while the study on soybean processing industry was not deep and comprehensive enough, so I hope that futures studies can make up for these shortages. |
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