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China is about to do to the global supply chains for grains, livestock and food products what it has already done to the world’s energy and transport systems.
The country is pursuing what amounts to world dominance in the mass manufacture of protein, launching a breakneck plan to end its strategic dependence on food imports and insure its people against the long-term famine risks of climate change.
The Politburo’s 15th five-year plan is marshalling all levers of finance and state power to overcome land and water limits, placing food security on a par with defence as an existential imperative for national survival.
Analysts at consultancy Systemiq say the Communist Party is activating the same playbook already used for solar power, electric vehicles and batteries to reach 70 per cent or more of the world market from a standing start in less than 15 years – a pattern also visible in its push for semiconductors, nuclear fusion, quantum computing and pharmaceuticals.
It is developing genetically modified seeds and crops, but it is also targeting the fast-growing industries of cellular agriculture, lab-grown proteins and food from precision fermentation: Frankenfoods to some, the saviour of humanity to others.
Systemiq foresees a protein revolution picking up speed through the 2030s and 2040s that will radically change what the Chinese people eat, with spillover effects across Asia and the world. It estimates that half of China’s fish and beef consumption, and 40 per cent of its dairy products, will come from “alt-protein” sources by the mid-century.
The country’s leaders have fretted about their food vulnerability for a long time. China has 15 per cent of the world’s population, 8 per cent of its arable land, and 6 per cent of usable freshwater – and some of that is badly polluted with nitrogen.
The Sino-American struggle for global hegemony and the risk of a future US maritime blockade has brought matters to a head. So has the frightening pace of climate damage to Chinese agriculture. The country is now acting fast to future-proof itself for a Hobbesian “three-degree” world.
A throbbing hive of “doctoral farms” and technology courtyards has sprung to life in the Pinggu valley north-east of Beijing, best known for its blanket of pink peach blossom in late spring. It is billed as China’s second Silicon Valley, an agricultural tech (ag-tech) twin to the digital-tech hub at Haidian on the other side of the city.
Other enzyme and amino acid hubs with different niches are being developed in the Yangtze River Delta and Guangdong. “It suggests a shift from isolated pilots towards a coordinated industrial ecosystem. This geographic clustering mirrors patterns observed in solar manufacturing and EV production during their pre-scale phases,” said Systemiq.
The Pinggu nerve centre has begun making proteins for commercial use from micro-algae, as well as EPA fish oil and paramylon which is used in protein bars and cereals.
The question of how soon climate change will erode global food output is a contested debate. The “CO² fertilisation effect” of higher carbon levels has until now been a net plus for crop yields due to faster photosynthesis and reduced water loss via stomatal conductance.
A Royal Society study last year concluded that we have passed the tipping point where friend turns to foes. The carbon dioxide benefits flatten out while the damage from heat stress and degradation of nutrients bites harder.
Scientists from the US, Europe and China concluded in a seminal Nature paper that global crop yields are likely to be 8 per cent lower by 2050 than they would otherwise have been, even after adjusting for plausible ways of adapting. But we don’t know for sure and the process will not be linear.