ACCORDING to Focus Economy soybeans are among the top traded commodities in the world.
Soybeans are a key global agricultural product, used for animal feed, vegetable oil production and biofuels.
Argentina, Brazil and the United States dominate production, while China is by far the largest importer.
Soybeans are used to feed the Asian nation’s vast livestock industry. As such, global soybean demand is heavily influenced by shifts in China’s meat consumption, as well as by weather conditions affecting harvests in supplying countries and trade policies. Regarding the latter, China temporarily imposed tariffs on US soybeans in 2018 in retaliation to US tariff s, causing US soybean exports to China to collapse until the two countries reached a trade truce.
On the supply side, climate change poses risks to future production, with droughts and extreme weather increasingly impacting yields in the Americas. For now, soybean price forecast is for a lower average price in 2025 vs 2024 and to be at the lowest level since 2020, dampened by a record soybean harvest in Brazil and softer economic growth in China.
That said, solid demand for plant based proteins and biofuels should provide support. Renewed Chinese tariffs on US soybeans pose a downside risk to price
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