WASHINGTON — Prices have dropped and sales have cratered for one of Oklahoma’s biggest agricultural exports, as China has purchased no soybeans from U.S. farmers since September.
“The U.S. soybean industry has a profound, positive impact on the U.S. economy,” said Caleb Ragland, president of the American Soybean Association, in testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee. “We have long been U.S. agriculture’s number one export crop, and a by-the-numbers look demonstrates the value of the soybean industry to our domestic economic health.”
Tariffs placed on China by President Donald Trump resulted in a trade war between the two countries. China slowed their soybean purchases in April, and numbers continued to drop until September, when no purchases were made over the period of a month for the first time since 2018. While a reported trade agreement from Oct. 30 calls for China to resume purchasing American at roughly the same quantity it has in recent years, the issue has been drawing attention from elected officials for months.
“It’s a struggle because China is one of our largest purchasers of soybeans internationally,” said U.S. Sen. James Lankford (R-OK). “China is in a trade negotiation with the president, and so they’ve stopped buying soybeans.”
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the U.S. exported $12.64 billion in soybeans to China in 2024, by far the most to any country — the European Union, the next highest buyer, imported only $2.45 billion. As Oklahoma’s second most planted crop, the impact has been significant.
This story was reported by Gaylord News, a Washington reporting project of the Gaylord College of Journalism and Mass Communication at the University of Oklahoma.
“There’s concerns, and it’s all about exports,” said Oklahoma state Rep. Kenton Patzkowsky (R-Balko), chairman of the agriculture subcommittee of the House Committee on Energy and Natural Resources Oversight. “We’re at a difficult spot on soybean markets right now. So yeah, there is a lot of concern.”
Oklahoma farmers produced 10.66 million bushels of soybeans in 2023, according to the USDA. With a crop that abundant, farmers need lots of buyers.
“They just shut it off,” Lankford said. “When that happens, we’re growing a crop we expect to be able to sell, and then there’s no buyer.”
When China stopped purchasing soybeans, the prices dropped, and Oklahoma farmers are beginning to see the effects. The price drop has been especially noticeable for operations that rely heavy on exports for their income.
“That’s a major problem,” said Lankford. “The price just collapses at that point, which really affects a lot of the farmers in Oklahoma.”
‘We’ve got to get them shipped out’
With the loss of the exports to China, soybeans began to stockpile as the supply overtakes the demand. Stores and storage facilities are filling up, and farmers are being forced to make decisions about whether to sell at the current price or wait until the market improves.
“The export demand issues, we can’t just keep stacking soybeans up in stores,” Patzkowsky said. “We’ve got to get them shipped out. (…) It weighs heavy on market prices. We’re seeing that right now.”
Soybeans are one of Oklahoma’s top crops. About 460,000 acres of land were used to farm soybeans in Oklahoma in 2023, according to the Oklahoma Soybean Board. The acreage has remained relatively stable over recent years, reflecting both the crop’s popularity and the limits of land available for soybean production.
“Until the prices dropped, it was very close to thriving,” Patzkowsky said. “It’s a very popular crop right now.”
Farmers across the country are dealing with the fallout from the tariff war caused by the U.S. and China.
“Commodity prices are down nearly 50 percent from highs experienced three years ago, while farmers are still facing elevated prices for land, seeds, fertilizer, pesticides and farm machinery,” Ragland wrote in his testimony. “For U.S. soybean farmers, 2025 has proven to be a remarkably challenging year. We are facing immense export market losses with our largest customer — China — turning to our South American competitors for soybean purchases. Due to retaliatory tariffs imposed by China, soybean farmers have lost our biggest export market.”
Soybeans closed Nov. 5 at $11.10 per bushel on the Chicago market, two-thirds of what soybeans received in 2022. Soybeans hit a low of $8 per bushel in May 2019 but subsequently recovered during the COVID-19 pandemic. By June 2022, the average price peaked at $16.40 per bushel, according to the USDA.
The impending U.S. Supreme Court decision on presidential authority over tariffs could significantly affect soybean prices. A ruling limiting tariffs could boost exports and lower input costs, driving prices up. A decision upholding current authority could maintain trade friction, suppressing demand and keeping prices under pressure.
The Supreme Court is expected to come to a ruling in the next few months.
The U.S. and China have been in trade talks, as Trump and Chinese President Xi Jingping met to reach a conclusion on their trade war. While no soybeans have been purchased yet, Xi and Trump agreed to a deal with soybean exports resuming as one of its terms.
According to U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins in a post on Twitter, China will “buy at least 12 million metric tons in U.S. soybeans this year” and at least 25 million metric tons in U.S. soybeans each year in 2026, 2027 and 2028.
As China has promised to begin purchasing soybeans again, Oklahoma farmers can hope to see the soybean market stabilize. The recovery will likely be slow, but renewed demand could prevent further price drops and reduce the backlog of stored soybeans.
“It doesn’t look so great right now, but hang in there,” Patzkowsky encouraged farmers. “Tighten your belt. We’re just going through a rough time right now. It’ll get better. Hang in there. Don’t give up.”
