Tag Archives: agritech

Chinese Interest in US Agriculture: Warning of weaponization of seeds and bio warfare

Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.

Important Takeaways:

  • Security Threat: China’s Interest in US Agriculture
  • The more US agricultural technology China acquires, especially through theft, in order to become dominant in the agritech field, the worse the US will fare when it comes to selling its own technology, whether to China or third countries.
  • China has been expanding its ownership of US land over the past decade from 13,720 acres in 2010 to 352,140 acres in 2020, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)
  • China’s largest purchase in the US agriculture sector so far has been Smithfield Foods in 2013, the largest pork producer in the US. China’s WH Group — a state-owned company, which began as a meatpacking business in China — owns it today. At the time of the sale, Smithfield had 25 U.S. plants, 460 farms, and contracts with 2,100 producers in 12 states and the ownership of Smithfield accounted for more than 146,000 acres of US land.
  • The potential weaponization of agricultural IP is possible,” the USSC warned. “… Similar to hacking a computer code, Beijing could easily hack the code or DNA of U.S. GM seeds and conduct bio warfare by creating some type of blight that could destroy U.S. crops… a virus or fungus engineered to kill a GM plant could wipe out an entire crop…”

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