China is cracking down on beef imports and says it is ready to slap Australia with an additional 55 per cent tariff in the coming days. Australia has already reached 90 per cent of an annual beef import quota that China introduced at the start of the year.
Once the quota is hit, subsequent beef imports into China will be subject to the tariff, which is likely to impact demand from one of Australia's largest markets. Australia's annual import quota was set at 205,000 tonnes, about one-third lower than its total imports into China from 2025.
Earlier this week, China's Ministry of Finance and Commerce issued an alert to Australia that it had reached about 90 per cent of its quota, just six months into the year. This is the fourth such alert since the new quota system started.
Meat and Livestock Australia general manager of international markets, Andrew Cox, said there would likely be a reduction in trade with China once the new tariffs are imposed. 'I don't think it will totally stop, but certainly 55 per cent is a significant barrier to trade,' he said.
Mr Cox noted that many Chinese customers had been incentivised to buy big in the first half of the year to beat the tariffs, contributing to Australia approaching the quota so soon. He added that farmers were already looking to other South-East Asian markets to sell their produce.
