Agricultural trade between EU and China

Abstract

Since China acceded to the WTO, it has attached great importance to the opening of agriculture, and trade in agricultural products has become increasingly active. Over the years, China is still increasing its efforts to open up to the outside world, and the EU, as an important economic partner of China, has seen rapid growth in agricultural trade between the two sides in the last decade. Among them, China's agricultural imports from the EU are the fastest growing, especially dairy products and pork. Eurostat (2021) points out that China has become the third-largest agricultural export market in the EU after the UK's exit from the EU. China's agricultural trade with the US has suffered a setback due to trade frictions between China and the US. Based on this, this paper examines the development of agricultural trade between the two sides from the perspective of agricultural resources and development and the perspective of the EU Common Agricultural Policy, "One Belt, One Road," and trade facilitation. In addition, the EU is a multinational international alliance. China has not yet reached a cooperative trade agreement with the EU, so it is necessary to analyze the agricultural trade between EU member states and China.

The idea of this paper is as follows: First, we sort out the development of agricultural trade between the EU and China, analyze the changes in the structure of agricultural trade between them during the decade, and use trade theory combined with empirical analysis to analyze the trade characteristics of basic agricultural products, dairy products and meat by category and nationality. These data explain the basic overview of agricultural trade between the EU and China. Second, the EU Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is used as an entry point to analyze the impact of CAP on agricultural production and trade within the EU and how it indirectly or directly affects the agricultural trade between the EU and China. Finally, based on the "One Belt, One Road" and trade facilitation, we analyze how China's "One Belt, One Road" policy promotes bilateral trade facilitation and what advantages it can bring to China-EU agricultural trade in the future.