Toward sustainable soybean supply and consumption in China under climate change and policy adaptation

Abstract

Ensuring sustainable soybean supply and consumption under climate change is critical for global food and environmental security. China, as the world's largest soybean consumer, exerts substantial influence on global land use, trade flows, and carbon emissions through its evolving supply and consumption patterns. This study applies a computable general equilibrium model combined with an environmentally extended input-output approach to quantify how climate change and adaptive policy measures affect China's soybean supply and consumption and further transmit to the global supply chain. The results reveal that external shocks and climate stressors jointly reduce China's soybean production by up to 4.83%. Enhancing domestic self-sufficiency alone cannot close the growing demand gap, which leads to import reductions of 1.32%–8.26%. However, climate change intensifies supply risks and increases reliance on major exporters, while raising their emissions. By 2060, China's imports from Brazil and the other Latin American regions are projected to rise by 2.13%–2.82% and 2.15%–3.76%, respectively, with embodied emissions increasing by 91.90 × 10³–124.28 × 10³ tCO₂ and 15.75 × 10³–27.08 × 10³ tCO₂. Production subsidies could boost domestic production by 5.89%, reduce imports by 3.55%, and lower emissions by 253.54 × 10³ tCO₂. Technological advancements can mitigate climate-induced production declines by 1.36%–9.13% globally, stabilize Chinas's soybean imports within −0.01%–0.08%, and reduce emissions by 4.78 × 10³–45.60 × 10³ tCO₂. These adaptive strategies provide actionable insights for improving the resilience of the soybean supply chain.