America's farmers stand to lose the most in a China trade war – CNBC

Fuente Web

If the United States and China have a trade war, American farmers could be the ones who take the biggest hit.

"A significant part of U.S. exports in China and greater China are agricultural products," said Brad Setser, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.

"The Chinese have made it clear that if the U.S. were to impose some kind of duties, … China would respond in some way and on exports to China," he said.

China is the second largest market for U.S. agricultural exports, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture Foreign Agricultural Service. Of the $20.2 billion in farm exports to China in 2015, soybeans accounted for $10.5 billion.

And in retaliation for any U.S. tariffs on China, Beijing will take action against the soybean and corn industries, China's state-backed Global Times said in an editorial after the U.S. presidential election. Rising tensions between the U.S. and China have many in the agriculture industry concerned.