BEIJING (Reuters) – China has called for Chinese farmers to grow more grain and to receive a guaranteed income, after the expiry earlier this week of the Black Sea grain deal that allowed safe export of Ukraine’s grain and supported food security.
According to broadcaster CCTV, which cited the Central Financial and Economic Affairs Commission chaired by president Xi Jinping on Thursday, lawmakers said it was necessary to use China’s saline-alkali land to its full potential and expand agricultural production capacity.
China will safeguard its current red line of 1.8 billion mu (120 million hectares)of arable land.
Russia halted participation in the United Nations-brokered Black Sea grain deal on Monday over what it called a failure to meet its demands to implement a parallel agreement easing rules for its own food and fertiliser exports.
Within days of withdrawing from the deal, Russia attacked the southern Ukrainian port of Chornomorsk, which Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba on Thursday said had destroyed 60,000 tons of wheat destined for China and grain export infrastructure.
(Reporting by Amy Lv and Dominique Patton in Beijing; Editing by Alexandra Hudson)
