Source: NCDA&CS, 5/19/20
1. Quick Facts & Predictions:
l Chinese Vice Premier Liu He, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven T. Mnuchin, and Ambassador Robert Lighthizer participated in a conference call on May 8th. They discussed economic and trade issues, including the recently concluded Phase One agreement.
The parties discussed the ongoing process of implementing the Phase One agreement between the two countries that went into effect February 14. Both sides agreed that good progress is being made on creating the governmental infrastructures necessary to make the agreement a success. They also agreed that in spite of the current global health emergency, both countries fully expect to meet their obligations under the agreement in a timely manner. Meetings required by the agreement have been conducted via conference call and will continue on a regular basis.
l In addition to the tariff exclusions announcement on May 4th, USTR granted another tariff exclusion requests on May 8th. Despite the interest groups’ requests, the tariff exclusion announcements are also in response to the growth of U.S exports especially agriculture and energy commodities to China market in the first quarter this year.
Not sure about if the phase one agreement can be delivered in a timely
manner because of the interruption of the pandemic, but we can certainly expect more good news on the issue in the coming months.
While I am preparing for this report, China issued two new tariff exemption lists and will eliminate all retaliatory tariffs for those U.S products on the lists. There are no agricultural products on the lists, but it is another positive step towards the implementation of Phase one agreement.
l China National Bureau of Statistics released a new data on May 12th showing that pork price increased 96.9% in April year-on-year. And the prices of other meat commodities increased between 8.2% and 20.5%. The trend is slowing down a bit compared with previous months, but it is urgent enough for the authorities to increase supplies sourcing from both imports and domestic supplies.
l The number of existing patients in China is 194 today and the number of critical patients is only 9. Both numbers are less than 40% of last week’s numbers. And around 40% of all students went back to schools until May 11th.
The government authority is closely watching on the situation after the reopen and a small town in Jilin province called Shulan was locked down because there were 15 new confirmed patients last week. Moreover, Wuhan identified a new confirmed case after a month of zero increase and the municipal government decided to provide Covid-19 test for everyone in the city within the next 10 days.
l NCDA China Office continues to fully open and we are also working on plans to reinforce our online promotion of NC ag and consumer products in China market as a new marketing strategy during and after the pandemic.
2. Facts & Numbers: (until 14:00, May 14th; Beijing Time)
l Name: COVID-19 (Novel Coronavirus Pneumonia)
l Number of Confirmed Patients:
Ø China:
u Total: 84,464 people (previous week: 84,407; 0.05% increase)
u Existing: 194 people (previous week: 555)
u Existing patients with no symptoms: 712 (previous week:903)
l Epidemic Development Trends：
Ø China:
The situation continues to improve, and government authority has been closely inspecting on the new confirmed cases after the reopen. A small town call Shulan became the new focus since there were 15 new cases last week. And Wuhan decided to provide test for everyone in the city after identifying a new confirmed case earlier this week. So far, we don’t see any major threat after the reopen.
3. Impact On China Market
l In April, food prices rose by 14.8% year-on-year, affecting CPI by about 2.98%. Among them, pork prices rose 96.9%, beef, lamb, chicken and duck meat rose 8.2% to 20.5%. The price increase of pork is slowing down because of increasing supplies and over 40,000 metric tons of pork will arrive in China from the U.S this week. Though the challenge remains afterwards since pork is the most popular meat in the market and it is directly impacting on price of other meat commodities.
At the same time, the price of eggs fell by 3.4%, and the prices of fresh fruits and vegetables fell by 10.5% and 3.7%, respectively.
The high level of consumer prices created challenges for lower income families, and I saw an old lady complaining about paying about 30 USD
for a piece pork ribs in a supermarket. And I was a little terrified to pay 8 USD for 200 grams of lamb.
l Guangdong province was the first province that decided to continue all trade shows and conferences after May 9th when it lowered its epidemic response level to Level 3. And shopping malls, supermarkets, hotels and restaurants will fully open too. People will also have limited access to libraries, museums and galleries, etc.
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