American beef producers are ecstatic at the chance to sell meat to new markets in China under President Donald Trump’s bi-lateral trade agreement announced Thursday.
The trade deal will open Chinese markets for American beef by July, allowing American producers to export meat for the first time in 13 years.
“After being locked out of the world’s largest market for 13 years, we strongly welcome the announcement that an agreement has been made to restore U.S. beef exports to China,” the National Cattleman’s Beef Association said in a statement.
China banned U.S. beef in 2003 after it discovered imported meat contaminated with mad cow disease. American beef exports dropped from $3 billion to $1.1 billion by 2004, but the market has since recovered to pre-2003 levels without exporting to China.
Trump’s trade deal reaffirms a preliminary agreement made in September for China to lift the ban on U.S. beef.
“It’s impossible to overstate how beneficial this will be for America’s cattle producers, and the Trump Administration deserves a lot of credit for getting this achieved,” the Cattleman’s Association said. (RELATED: Trump Team Hails US-China Trade Deal As ‘Herculean Accomplishment’)
The deal also admits the U.S. market for China’s cooked poultry, potentially affecting American poultry producers, but the White House is not worried about it.
“U.S.-China relationships are now hitting a new high, especially in trade,” Commerce Wilbur Ross said announcing the trade deal Thursday. “This was pretty much a herculean accomplishment to get this done. This is more than has been done in the whole history of U.S.-China relations on trade.”
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