Climate Change Is Battering China’s Agriculture Sector. Here’s How It Is Responding.

China is facing pressure on its food supply, even as it seeks to reduce its reliance on agricultural imports.

The country feeds nearly 20% of the global population, but must do so with less than 9% of its arable land and only 6% of its water resources, according to Reuters. Rising temperatures, erratic rainfall and more frequent droughts and floods are battering Chinese agriculture, jeopardizing decades of food self-sufficiency policy. Wheat, rice and maize—the cornerstones of the country’s food system—are increasingly exposed to climate shocks.

“Climate change poses a severe threat to China’s food security,” former agriculture minister Tang Renjian said in early 2024, noting that extreme weather events have already reduced yields in several major grain-producing provinces. In the same year, the Ministry of Agriculture warned that “unusual changes in temperature and rainfall can slow down the growth of food crops, resulting in a drop in the average yield of grains.”

China’s agricultural sector is uniquely sensitive to climate change. The northern plains, home to a majority of China’s wheat production, are becoming hotter and drier. The southern provinces, which grow much of the country’s rice, are increasingly prone to flooding. According to the China Meteorological Administration, average national temperatures have risen faster than the global average, climbing more than 1.6°C since the 1950s.

The country has managed to preserve about 95% self-sufficiency in wheat for nearly two decades. But climate stress is forcing new strategies to the fore, both in agricultural practices and in international trade.

To address growing risks, the Chinese government has embedded climate adaptation directly into its agricultural-reform agenda. The country’s 14th Five-Year Plan (2021 to 2025) prioritizes investments in water-saving irrigation, climate-resilient seeds, precision farming technologies and early-warning systems for extreme weather.

In addition to bolstering domestic yields, China is hedging its food security by deepening trade relations along its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) network, especially with countries in the Global South, to secure grain from a broader base of suppliers.

China Seeks to Limit Agricultural Imports

Wheat has historical and cultural roots that run deep in China, and the stakes for maintaining supply stability are high. The country consumes more than 130 million tonnes of wheat annually, largely to produce staples like noodles, dumplings and steamed buns. While the bulk of demand is met by domestic harvests, higher-end processed foods increasingly rely on imported wheat with specific quality characteristics—particularly from countries like Canada, France, Australia and the United States.

But as Trump’s universal tariffs strategy demonstrates, trade relations are anything but predictable.

In 2019, Canada was China’s leading supplier of imported wheat. By mid-2020, that changed dramatically. The diplomatic row over the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou led to a sharp drop in Canadian wheat purchases, down from more than 50% of imports in 2019 to just 15% by mid-2020. The influential online Chinese media portal Sohu blamed “wrong decisions” made by Canada for the souring of trade ties.

Australia, once a beneficiary of Canada’s fall from favour, has seen its own wheat exports face heightened inspections in China. While this hasn’t triggered a formal ban, it’s a sign that bilateral tensions can quickly spill into food trade.

These shifting trade patterns highlight a deeper strategic calculus. China wants to limit its dependence on Western suppliers for food staples, just as it has for semiconductors and energy. Expanding partnerships with emerging economies such as Kazakhstan, Pakistan and Brazil are a cornerstone of this plan.

Challenges for China’s Agricultural Productivity

Meanwhile, internal agricultural productivity is under stress. In a 2022 report, the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences estimated that climate-related yield reductions could amount to 5% to 10% by 2030 under current warming trends. One study estimated that China’s key cereal crops could lose around 2.6% yield per degree Celsius of warming, with more vulnerable regions facing up to 12.7% loss per degree across wheat, rice and maize. Another study with different crop modelling—in this case without carbon dioxide fertilization—projected up to 37% yield decline within decades if warming continues unchecked.

For a country where 1.4 billion people depend on food-system stability, even small disruptions can cascade.

China isn’t short on ambition to use technology to solve big problems. It leads the world in the development of hybrid rice varieties and is rapidly digitizing its farm sector with satellite monitoring, AI-driven pest prediction and big-data analytics for yield forecasting. Other innovations come from its “Smart Agriculture” program, which integrates advanced tools such as sensors, drones and blockchain technology into the food supply chain.

Historical memory still shapes China’s focus on food security, especially the famine of 1958 to 1962 that led to the deaths of an estimated 15 to 55 million people – one of the deadliest disasters of the 20th century. While today’s threats are different, the possibility of disruption carries echoes of the past. The Chinese government’s commitment to self-reliance now finds new motivation in the science of climate change.

Cover photo:  Wending village farmland in Yunnan, China. (Wikipedia)