Food & Resource Security

North American Blue Energy Partners Inc. is loading nearly 1 million barrels for delivery into China, according to a document seen by Bloomberg. The cargo may be the first delivery of Venezuelan oil to the Asian country since the US took control of the nation’s

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earlier this year.

Sludgy Venezuelan oil can help replace some of the heavy production from Iraq that’s been

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since the start of the Iran war. The conflict, which has upended global flows, may provide an outlet for the millions of barrels of Venezuelan crude currently sitting in

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in the Caribbean. North American Blue Energy’s oil is currently loading onto the tanker Skage, the document shows. It’s expected to take 950,000 barrels of Merey 16 oil, one of Venezuela’s primary crude grades, for delivery to the port of Qingdao, in China.

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The pursuit of self-reliance can be costly and potentially inefficient. Why construct oil pipelines from Myanmar or Russia when the stuff can be shipped so easily? Why develop semiconductor fabs when you can buy from chip foundries abroad? Because unfettered access to foreign markets is never guaranteed—something China is all too familiar with.

A decade ago there were those in China, such as Zhang Weiying, a liberal economist, who railed against state-led industrial investments as wasteful. After a decade of fending off American sanctions and coping with disruptions to supply chains—first from covid and now from the Iran war—such criticism has lost its bite. Indeed, many in the West have come around to the Communist Party’s way of seeing things. Corporate bosses in America and Europe may not be inclined to use terminology with autarkic undertones. But building redundancy into supply chains? That is a formulation they can get behind.

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LAUNCESTON, Australia, March 19 (Reuters) - China increased imports of iron ore at the start of this year, but the extra volumes are being used to build inventories to record highs rather than lift steel production. The increase in imports appears largely driven by softer prices for the key steel raw material, but it is also fortuitous given the potential for the fallout from the U.S. and ‌Israeli attacks on Iran to spread beyond energy markets.

China, which buys about three-quarters of global seaborne iron ore, saw arrivals of 210.02 million metric tons in the first two months of 2026, up 10% from the same period a year earlier, according to customs data released on March 10. The robust start to the year came after imports hit a record monthly high of 119.65 million tons in December, which took arrivals for 2025 to an all-time annual high of 1.26 billion tons. The strength in iron ore imports isn't because of higher steel production, with output in the first two months dropping 3.6% from the same period in 2025 to 160.34 million ⁠tons, according to official data released on March 16.

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Chinese scientists have identified a key gene in wild rice that controls perennial traits, a discovery that could allow cultivated rice to be harvested multiple times from a single planting and improve food production efficiency.

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China will carry out its second round of frozen pork stockpiling this year for state reserves after live hog prices in March fell to their lowest level in nearly eight years, as policymakers seek to cushion a deepening plunge that is hurting rural incomes and adding to deflationary pressure. The Ministry of Commerce said on Thursday that it would work with the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) and the Ministry of Finance to undertake pork stockpiling. “The Ministry of Commerce will continue to closely monitor the pork market, strengthen trend analysis, and coordinate with relevant departments to manage reserves and ensure market stability,” the ministry said in a statement on its website.

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BEIJING/SINGAPORE, April 7 (Reuters) - Farmers around the world may be switching to less nutrient-hungry crops as the Iran war hits the supply of fertilisers, but in China, they're sitting pretty with plenty of stock thanks to the country's rather unique reliance on coal to ‌produce urea.

Whereas other big exporters of urea - a nitrogen-based plant nutrient - like Russia, Qatar and Saudi Arabia use gas to produce it, some 78% of China's urea output is produced with coal - a relatively cheap resource it has in abundance. "China is largely self-sufficient in urea and it is less exposed to natural gas price volatility than many ⁠other producing regions," said Willis Thomas, head of fertilisers analysis at CRU.

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TAIZHOU, China, April 7 (Reuters) - At the edge of one of the many pig farms spread across the vast, unbroken floodplains of Taizhou, a two-hour drive northwest of Shanghai, a pair of square, four-metre pools of acrid-smelling ochre liquid hold the key to cutting costly soybean use in half. The pools hold a swill of cheaper, locally sourced ingredients, which ‌can include brans, pumpkin vines and wine lees. But it is fermented - like yogurt - so the proteins are already broken down and easy to digest, lessening the need for the higher-quality proteins in soy, 80% of which China imports.

The government sharply accelerated a drive to expand protein sources for livestock in March of last year, just as trade tensions ramped up early into President Donald Trump's second term. Soybeans quickly became a ⁠key

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. Reuters interviews with dozens of livestock and feed producers, state researchers and industry experts revealed Beijing is moving faster than previously thought to deploy new technologies and promote fermented feed.

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