Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said China complies with the terms of bilateral trade agreements and the United States constantly monitors China’s commitments in an effort to maintain a stable trade relationship.
“With China, we always check and monitor and monitor the commitments. The commitments are pretty specific,” Greer said Sunday on Fox News. Sunday briefing. “So all of these things that we recently agreed with the Chinese are very concrete, we can monitor them with some ease, and so far we see that they are in compliance.”
Greer said China is about “a third” of the way through its soybean purchase commitment for this growing season.
Bloomberg previously reported that after a series of orders placed in late October — the first this season — China’s purchases of U.S. soybeans appeared to have stalled.
President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed in late October to extend a tariff truce, abolish export controls and reduce other trade barriers. But some elements of the deal — including soy purchases, the sale of social media app TikTok and increased export licenses for critical rare earths from China — remain in the works.
U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Greer had a video call with Chinese Vice Premier He Lifeng on Friday, according to China’s official Xinhua news agency, during which the officials had an “in-depth and constructive” discussion in which they pledged to maintain stable ties and address “respective concerns” on trade and the economy, the outlet said.
Read more: Top U.S., Chinese officials pledge cooperation on trade deal
Bessent told CBS News on Sunday: Face the nation that China will not accelerate its purchases, but that they should nevertheless take place this agricultural season and that soybean prices have increased by 12 to 15% since the agreement with China. He also said he divested from a soy farm to comply with an ethics agreement.
The Trump administration is expected to release its long-awaited farm aid plan this week, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said at a cabinet meeting last Tuesday.
When asked whether chipmakers like Nvidia should supply advanced chips to China or whether doing so would pose a security risk to the United States, Greer expressed the need for the United States to be cautious.
“My own view is we need to be very careful about this,” Greer said on Fox News. “We want companies’ bottom lines to do well, but as policymakers we need to make sure that national security comes first, and that’s why you’ve heard President Trump talk about the types of chips that could be restricted and there’s always an open discussion about where that threshold is, and it changes over time.”
