China ownership raises US food fears

Washington, July 22 US Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins warned Congress that Chinese ownership, foreign dependence and corporate consolidation had created national-security vulnerabilities across the US food system. Rollins said America had weakened its farms and rural communities by moving food production overseas and allowing control of agricultural processing, fertiliser and seed production to become concentrated among a small number of businesses. “As long as we are beholden to foreign and even hostile countries for our food and our fuel, our freedom is in jeopardy,” she told the Senate Appropriations Committee. Rollins said nearly 85 per cent of US meat-packing capacity…