The population of 1.4 billion, two large Asian countries, one in the hand holds the world's procurement, but the one opens the warehouse to sell goods around, China imports food, India exports food, this "buyer" and "seller" play code, in the global food market has grown well.
But if you really put your rice bowl to your mouth and look closely, you will find that China is not without food when buying grain, but India is not full when selling grain. This "meal account" behind it hides the different abacus of agriculture, economy and security between the two countries.
At the poker table of food globalization, China has changed its style of play
Let's talk about this big chess game of global grain trade. In 2025, Trump has returned to the White House. He has no mercy on his lips and tariffs have been increased as usual. This round of tariff storm has directly hit the agricultural product market, especially soybeans.
The United States was originally the main supplier of Chinese soybeans, and as a result, China simply changed its seats, no longer ordered from the United States, and turned to Brazil and Argentina.
This wave of operation appears to be passive, in practice, China is not hard on the U.S. "agricultural product label", but by signing long-term procurement agreements with South America, while securing supply, while also accompanied by "supporting" the South American economy, the data of the Ministry of Commerce at first glance, in the first half of 2025, China's import of soybeans from South America increased by 36%, of which Brazil accounted for 70%.
Farmers in South America are laughing, but farmers in the Midwestern United States are complaining of "losing their biggest buyer."
But don't get me wrong, China is not "unable to afford to grow it by itself", but "careful budget". China's annual grain output is stable at 650 million tons, which is divided by everyone, far exceeding the international food security line.
What is bought is not the rice and flour eaten by ordinary people, but "structural grains", such as soybeans and corn, which are used as feed for pigs, cattle and sheep, or for deep industrial processing.
Why import these? Because planting these things consumes a lot of land, drinks fiercely water, and the output value is not high. China chooses to leave land resources to more efficient crops, and regards imports as the "regulating valve" of resource allocation. Simply put, importing soybeans is to eat more meat, not because of lack of food.
At the same time, China has also undertaken a "differentiated import strategy", while looking for suppliers from the Five Lakes and Four Seas, avoiding being "cut off" by a single country, while investing in agricultural infrastructure overseas, holding the supply chain firmly in their hands.
In recent years, China's cooperation with Brazil and Argentina has turned from buying and selling relations to "binding relations", even ports and railways have invested in funding, imports are buying, reserves are defending, and behind it is a national-level food security system project.
The effect of this strategy is not only reflected in the domestic, the global food market therefore quietly changed, South American exports exploded, U.S. inventory pressure, India's export policy was limited to a while, the world's food prices followed by shocks, international organizations such as FAO and WTO also began to re-evaluate food governance mechanisms.
China's strategy is obviously more like "stabilizing the ground." It not only protects itself, but also makes the global grain market less explosive.
India's largest exporter, but hunger is still at home
Looking at India, the figures are quite remarkable, in 2024, India's rice exports accounted for 40% of the global market, far behind Thailand and Vietnam.
But behind this hides a paradox, exports are rapidly rounded, but there is still a large number of people who are not satisfied, the UN's 2024 global hunger index, India ranks the world's top ten, malnutrition rate exceeds 16%, children's weight loss rate is the world's first.
This is not a new problem, but it is not an unspeakable problem. From a historical perspective, the plunder during the colonial period, the solidification of the caste system, and the uneven distribution of urban and rural resources have torn Indian society in two. On the one hand, it is the national strategy of earning foreign exchange through exports, and on the other hand, rural children cannot even drink a glass of milk.
Modi's government has vigorously pushed "export exchange for money" in these years, trying to support the GDP, earn foreign exchange, and compensate for the trade deficit, but this economic account is bustling, but the cost is domestic food price fluctuations, the poor people are harder to buy basic grain, in 2023, India has briefly implemented the ban on rice exports, because of the domestic food prices have risen, but the ban has been lifted, exports have rebounded rapidly, the root problem has always not been solved.
Low agricultural productivity is also India's old problem, although the cultivated land area is large and the climate conditions are good, but the agricultural mechanization rate is poorly low, and the irrigation system is also seriously aging.
Most of India's rural areas are still small farmers, relying on food, production stability is poor, and the Indian government itself has issued reports that agricultural production efficiency has been inadequate for a long time, income growth is slow, and farmers' debt is serious.
And the main export force, chili, steam rice, although popular in the international market, but the cost of cultivation is high, the water consumption is large, causing pressure on the ecological environment and the domestic demand market.
The money earned by exports did not transform into the driving force for rural development, but instead, to a certain extent, "re-sweeted" cities and export enterprises, and the gap between the poor and the rich in the field of food has been exhausted.
The Indian government's food policy is more like a "short, smooth and fast" economic operation rather than a set of "long-term stability" national strategies. There is no mechanism for ensuring people's livelihood, and the market relies too much on exports. This leads to beautiful foreign trade data on one hand, and the poor's jobs on the other hand are empty. The granary is not empty, but the distribution mechanism is lame.
Behind the logic of buying and selling is the logic of two countries.
The field of China-India food path, in fact, reflects a deeper governance philosophy, the bottom line of China's food policy, is "to ensure everyone has food to eat."
Relying not only on planting, but also on management, adjustment and forward-looking strategic reserves. From the national reserve system to agricultural modernization driven by science and technology, to the landing mechanism of precision poverty alleviation, China regards food security as its basic national policy and firmly holds its rice bowl in its own hands.
India, on the other hand, is more like the "market priority, exports dependent", grain is the instrument of exchange, not the cornerstone of people's livelihoods, which is not to say that exports are wrong, but exports can not replace social distribution, when grain from the field to the mouth is cut off by "export priority", the people of the bottom are naturally the first group that is damaged.
China's import strategy, in fact, is also an embodiment of resource management, by importing feed grain, reducing the pressure on the country's cultivated land and water resources, and achieving the maximization of land use.
India's export of water-consuming crops such as rice has aggravated groundwater depletion and ecological degradation. One is throttling expenditure and the other is releasing water. In the long run, the cost is self-evident.
Social fairness is also the baseline of food policy, China by precision poverty alleviation and minimum living guarantees, has basically eliminated the mass hunger phenomenon, while India's poor and rich gap is widened, grain although there is a lot, but can not enter the pocket of the poor, from the United Nations to the International Red Cross, have criticized India's "exporting big hunger phenomenon".
Today, with globalization fluctuations intensifying and climate uncertainty rising, China's strategy is to build a "resilience system" with diversified procurement, scientific and technological support, and reserve adjustment.
India is more dependent on market volatility, frequent policy swings, extreme high-temperature drought in early 2025 once again exposed the vulnerability of Indian agriculture, in contrast, China's central reserve system and price regulation mechanism, played the role of a stabilizer.
Looking to the future, food security is not only a rice bowl issue, but also a reflection of national governance capabilities. The concept of "community with a shared future for mankind" advocated by China has also gradually been implemented in agricultural technology and South-South cooperation. China is not so much buying food, but rather paying for global food stability.
And if India does not adjust the policy direction, it will be difficult to get out of the trouble of "export prosperity and domestic demand."
Behind the wave of food trade is a profound mapping of the development philosophy of the two countries, China using imports as leverage, pushing up resource optimization and people's livelihoods, highlighting the wisdom of the great countries, India is stuck in the paradox of export and hunger, revealing the imbalance of growth and fairness, in the globalization retrograde, China's differentiation strategy not only safeguarded its own livestock, but also injected stability into the world.
In the future, only to root food security in the well-being of the people can solve the mystery of growth, this is the most loud response from China's experience.
Source of information: News from the Economic and Commercial Department of the Consulate General in Mumbai 2025-06-09
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