U.S. pork will be gaining more access to China again through additional port renewals. This breakthrough was the result of combined efforts of the USDA and the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR), who have been working with China’s General Administration of Customs to renew the registrations of U.S. meat and poultry plants and facilities that expired earlier this year.
The recent renewals, which also include 83 poultry facilities, apply to product produced after June 11, according to a statement from the National Pork Producers Council.
These latest plant approvals came just a week after the U.S. and China agreed to move forward on the May trade deal they reached in Geneva, Switzerland, NPPC says.
“Export registrations for more than 1,000 U.S. meat plants were granted by China under the 2020 Phase 1 trade deal with the United States, but many expired in February and early March,” says the NPPC statement.
China previously renewed the registrations of 300-plus U.S. pork facilities in mid-March, then suspended renewals during tariff war after that.
“A win for certainty, NPPC has worked diligently with USDA and USTR to gain this very market access for U.S. pork,” the statement says. “Approval of these additional 23 pork processing plants opens further trade opportunities for certain types of U.S. pork products.”
The port renewals matter to U.S. pork producers as China has been an important destination for certain types of U.S. pork products, such as offal, that return more value to U.S. producers than they do in other countries.
More than 475,000 metric tons of U.S. pork valued at more than $1.1 billion was exported to China in 2024, and about 55% of pork variety meat (offal) exports go to China.
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