U.S. soybean futures climb to near three-year high
More than four decades after a young Xi Jinping traveled through Iowa’s corn and soybean country to learn how American farmers produced food, soybeans are again connecting China with the U.S. heartland. Chinese buyers purchased about 1 million metric tons of U.S. soybeans last week, accelerating a buying spree that has brought China close to halfway toward its commitment to purchase 25 million tons annually through 2028, United Press International reported.
The renewed buying has made soybeans a rare area of commercial cooperation in a U.S.-China relationship still strained by tariffs, technology restrictions, rare earths and national security concerns, UPI reported. For both countries, the soybean has become something more than an agricultural commodity; it is also a test of whether mutually beneficial trade can provide a measure of stability as strategic competition deepens.
The renewed soybean trade comes as Beijing prepares to put agriculture and food security on a broader international stage. From Thursday to Saturday, China is bringing together researchers, agribusiness leaders and international organizations for the 2026 World Agrifood Innovation Conference, or WAFI 2026. The gathering highlights Beijing’s effort to expand international cooperation on agriculture, food security and innovation even as trade tensions continue to complicate U.S.-China economic relations.
Trump and Xi are preparing for an expected Sept. 24 meeting in Washington. U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said agriculture is expected to figure in the discussions and that the two governments could make announcements involving agriculture and non-tariff trade barriers. The goal is not a sweeping new trade agreement, but managing a relationship in which the two economies remain deeply connected despite growing strategic competition, according to UPI.
The renewed trade underscores the complicated interdependence between the world’s two largest economies. China needs enormous quantities of soybeans for its livestock and food industries, while American farmers need access to the world’s largest soybean importer. Neither government has to settle disputes over semiconductors, artificial intelligence or national security to find reasons to trade beans, UPI reported. Soybeans illustrate that complicated interdependence.
Leading up to the high-stakes Trump-Xi meeting, there is growing evidence that China is following through on earlier purchasing commitments. But China’s buying behavior has split into two distinctly different tracks, driven by a mix of political maneuvering and an impending domestic supply crunch, UPI reported. State-owned Chinese companies have been responsible for much of the recent U.S. buying, while private Chinese soybean processors have largely remained on the sidelines. A 10% Chinese tariff on U.S. agricultural imports continues to make American beans less attractive to private crushers, even as their supplies from Brazil tighten. That distinction could make tariffs an important agricultural issue when Trump and Xi meet.
“Agricultural trade, especially soy, has long been a ballast stone in the U.S.-China relationship,” Jim Sutter, chief executive officer of the U.S. Soybean Export Council, told UPI. “Even when the broader relationship has faced turbulence, the soybean trade keeps a practical, working channel open between our two countries.” China has committed to purchase 25 million metric tons of U.S. soybeans during the new marketing year, a target Sutter said is reasonable based on current trade data. He said he expects shipments to China to accelerate in late September or early October as the U.S. harvest gains momentum and newly harvested soybeans begin moving into export channels.
Chinese processors are entering the fourth quarter with tightening Brazilian supplies, high import costs and weak processing margins. With Brazil’s next major harvest not expected until early 2027, China could become more reliant on U.S. soybeans during the Northern Hemisphere harvest.
“Farmers are expressing more dismay than anger over Trump’s trade policies,” David Peters, a professor of agricultural and rural policy at Iowa State University, told UPI. The trade dispute has added to pressures already facing soybean growers, including weak crop prices, high production costs and uncertainty over access to the Chinese market. Iowa soybean producers took a drastic hit last year, with net farm income dropping 50%, Peters said.
But Beijing is also working to reduce dependence on U.S. soybeans over the longer term. China announced Friday new agricultural insurance measures to protect farmers against production and market risks, expanding a broader food-security strategy that includes greater support for domestic soybean growers.
Meanwhile the market is already responding. U.S. soybean futures climbed to their highest level in nearly three years last week, fueled by renewed Chinese buying and expectations of tighter supplies. The U.S. Department of Agriculture raised its projected 2026-27 average farm price to $12 a bushel, up 60 cents from August, and cut its forecast for ending stocks to 310 million bushels.
For Susan Thornton, a senior fellow at Yale Law School’s Paul Tsai China Center, agriculture is one area where Washington and Beijing have an interest in preventing broader strategic tensions from disrupting trade. “Cooperation in this area is key to sustainable global food systems and should be shielded from tensions in other areas of U.S.-China relations,” Thornton told UPI. Her argument reflects a broader question surrounding the renewed soybean trade: whether agriculture can remain a relatively stable commercial channel even as Washington and Beijing seek to reduce dependence on each other in strategically sensitive industries.
Washington increasingly wants to reduce reliance on China in strategically sensitive sectors, including advanced technology and critical minerals, UPI reported. Agriculture presents a different calculation — an industry in which continued trade can benefit both economies without necessarily creating the same national security concerns.
Renewed Chinese demand offers American farmers welcome support, but also underscores the risks of relying heavily on a buyer that can shift purchases elsewhere.
“I’m very encouraged by the recent purchases, especially as U.S. soybean farmers begin harvesting the 2026 crop,” Dave Walton, an Iowa soybean farmer and vice president of the American Soybean Association, told UPI. “We want to see China continue fulfilling its commitment to purchase at least 25 million metric tons this year, but soybean farmers ultimately need more than individual purchase orders.” The export market hits close to home for Walton; more than half the soybeans grown on his farm are shipped overseas, aided by easy access to the Mississippi River, a major artery for U.S. agricultural exports.
China has spent years diversifying its agricultural suppliers and increasingly turning toward Brazil, a strategy that helped Beijing withstand earlier U.S.-China trade disputes and reduced America’s share of the Chinese soybean market. Yet current conditions also demonstrate the limits of diversification: Brazil cannot always provide unlimited supplies at competitive prices, particularly during the months between the South American and North American harvests. That gives U.S. growers a seasonal advantage, and gives Washington and Beijing a practical reason to keep agricultural trade flowing.
The soybean industry’s own strategy reflects lessons learned from earlier trade disputes. Walton wants to see the recent momentum continue beyond one meeting or one round of negotiations. While U.S. growers know that China buys soybeans at a scale that no other market can immediately replace, they also recognize that farmers cannot become overly dependent on any single export market. That balancing act mirrors the larger U.S.-China relationship.
Xi also has a personal connection to America’s agricultural heartland. As a local official from Hebei province in 1985, he visited Iowa farms and studied U.S. agricultural practices around Muscatine, beginning a relationship with the state that has lasted more than four decades. Xi’s Iowa ties do not drive China’s soybean purchases, which are shaped by economic and food-security priorities, but they provide a personal backdrop to a trade relationship that has endured years of political tension.
For Brody Childs, an Iowa State University student and eighth-generation farmer whose family grows about 1,350 acres of soybeans in western Illinois, China may seem distant from daily farm operations, but changes in the Chinese market are felt directly in farm income. “The biggest impact of the changing dynamics of U.S.-China relations is instability,” Childs told UPI. “The volatility of the whole situation has made it tough to rely on stable prices in the market.”