China Farm Deal Gives Trump Trade Win With Caveats

China will buy “at least” $17bn worth of US agricultural goods each year through 2028, the White House said, presenting the pledge as a concrete outcome from President Donald Trump’s summit with Chinese leader Xi Jinping in Beijing.

According to a fact sheet released on Sunday, the 2026 target will apply proportionally to the remainder of the year. The purchases are separate from China’s earlier commitment, made during Trump and Xi’s October summit in South Korea, to buy at least 87 million metric tonnes of US soya beans.

The White House said Beijing will also reopen parts of its market to US beef by renewing expired listings for more than 400 production facilities. China is also expected to resume poultry imports from US states that the Department of Agriculture determines are free of avian influenza.

China has not yet confirmed the announcement. The Chinese Embassy in Washington, DC, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

That silence matters because the summit itself produced more symbolism than detail. Trump and Xi wrapped up two days of talks on Friday with plenty of ceremony and warm public language, but few clearly defined agreements.

The White House said the two sides discussed ways to “enhance economic cooperation” and agreed on the need to keep the Strait of Hormuz open, as well as on the position that Iran “can never have a nuclear weapon.” Beijing’s version was more cautious, saying only that the Iranian nuclear issue and related disputes should be settled in a way that “accommodates the concerns of all parties”.

Taiwan, meanwhile, was absent from both White House statements, despite being one of the most sensitive issues in the US-China relationship. Xi had warned that the two powers could face “clashes and even conflicts” if the matter is not “handled properly”.

Alongside the agriculture pledge, Trump and Xi agreed to create two new bodies — the US-China Board of Trade and the US-China Board of Investment — to manage trade and investment disputes between the countries, according to the White House.

The announcement lands after years of trade friction that have sharply reduced commerce between the world’s two largest economies. US-China goods trade fell to about $415bn last year, down from more than $690bn in 2022.