Lawmakers Push Proposals to Limit China’s Farmland Purchases

Members of Congress who spoke during the House Agriculture Committee's March 20 hearing on China highlighted several proposals to restrict the communist country’s increasing acquisition of American agricultural land.

Rep. Mike Gallagher, R-Wis., chairman of the House Select Committee on China, urged Congress to pass the “Protecting U.S. Farmland and Sensitive Sites from Foreign Adversaries Act,” which he introduced in July (see 2307180022). His bill would give the Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. the power to block all land purchases by “foreign adversary” entities and would authorize CFIUS to consider U.S. food security as a factor in its national security reviews.

Under current law, "our foreign adversaries are able to purchase thousands of acres of our farmland and CFIUS can't even consider the potential impact on our food supply," Gallagher testified. "This strikes me as something Democrats and Republicans could come together [on] right now in this Congress and solve."

Gallagher also called for stopping the flow of valuable U.S. agricultural information to China and other adversaries, including satellite images, plant genetic data, and information on chemical and pesticide usage.

Rep. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., an Agriculture Committee member, promoted a bill she introduced last week to give CFIUS the authority to conduct national security reviews of significant real estate purchases by companies with ties to China, Iran, North Korea and Russia. The change would allow CFIUS to examine a much broader set of real estate transactions than it's currently authorized to review.

"It's not just farmland" that needs to be addressed, Slotkin said. "If you have a company coming in to do a huge purchase of our infrastructure, like hog slaughter, you should be putting that through that same intelligence community process to help us understand if that's a strategic threat to us."

Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., ranking member of the House Select Committee, highlighted new legislation to require the USDA to study U.S. supply chains for agricultural inputs, including vitamins, animal feed and pesticides. China “has been increasingly dominating the market and crowding out American and other suppliers,” he testified.

Gov. Kristi Noem, R-S.D., urged Congress to protect the U.S. against what she described as China’s efforts to "control our food supply." After buying chemical, fertilizer and food processing companies in the U.S., China has turned its sights to farmland, she said.

“China doesn’t allow American companies to own their land -- they don’t even allow their people to own land,” she testified. “Why would we allow them to purchase our most significant asset?”

Josh Gackle, president of the American Soybean Association, recommended a cautious approach, saying China is an important trading partner that accounted for over half of U.S. soybean exports in marketing year 2022-2023.

“Our strong appeal is that careful consideration be given to maintain, rather than alienate, the economic relationship when discussions move forward in addressing geopolitical and other significant issues,” Gackle testified.

Agriculture Committee Chairman Glenn Thompson, R-Pa., said he will seek to strike a balance between protecting the U.S. agricultural sector from threats and maintaining China as a key market for U.S. food exports.