the economist? a reliable source of anything but anglo billionaire propaganda, let alone factual material analysis... surely not.

• the largest US pork producer, Smithfield, was purchased by a Chinese firm in the 2013. the largest feedlot on the planet, in Tar Heel NC has been owned and operated by the WH Group since then (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WH_Group). any "IP", trade secrets and material (semen, records, maternal lines) are owned by them. but all of that is besides the point: chinese capitalists already own US pork production systems and facilities. the pork americans eat here was produced by their firms, with much of it exported to china. this is a good arrangement for them, because 1.) the mountain of feed is already here and owning a channel for adding value (converting grain into meat) is a way to engage in arbitrage when commodity markets get unstable 2.) the environmental destruction of this production system stays in the US 3.) worker rights and pay in US slaughter houses are the worst of the worst, unions are killed in the crib, child labor is rampant, etc. why would china want to bring any of these costs, which the US has externalized to broke rural communities, back home to china? not just the processing facilities, but the CAFO systems themselves are increasingly owned by foreign nationals (JBS Brazil, various Dutch psychos, etc), because worker and environmental protections in the US are a joke.

• animal breeds are a constantly changing artifact. pigs were domesticated in the near east and far east long before being brought to europe. the commercial breeds used today for CAFOs are wildly different in appearance and conformation to those of the exact same name 100 years ago. today, the industrial ag system optimizes for a single breed characteristic: feed to muscle gain ratio, based on a tweaked feed ration made primarily of the cheapest grain components. traits like "environmental hardiness", "mothering ability", "disease susceptibility", "fat production" etc are all ignored under the CAFO system. the point being, what defines an "elite" line is the system it is bred to inhabit, and generally the defenders of that system (which is 100% where the minds that wrote that article are coming from.... "the west has magic animals, they need our magic animals, our system is super relevant!"). meanwhile, the most expensive pork on the planet comes from one place in southern japan. "kagoshima kurobuta". the black pig. though japan already raised pigs for thousands of years, in the 1800s a diplomatic mission brought Berkshire pigs (from Berkshire england). on the generally rural southern island of Kyushu, the community developed a production system around the breed (similar to the Kobe place / Waygu breed assocation) with the understanding that spent mash (high protein) from making a sweet potato based alcohol would be constantly available in the area. what i mean by this is, aside from some wack ass outlier, any community with reasonable access to resources and in contact with the outside world can take a handful of animals and make whatever they're looking to make happen.

• all industrial firms seeking to maximize production maintain at least two breed lines, which they cross to generate an F1 hybrid and that animal is raised for animal products. hybrid vigor has been the move in commercial agriculture (plant and animal) since commercial agriculture was a thing. a herd of a breed can be closed at a surprisingly small population, though the smaller the size the closer it must be monitored for undesirable recessive traits. it also takes very little outside influence to overcome issues associated with line breeding. but the main point is this... in industrial agricultural systems (plant and animal) there are plants/animals grown for products, and plants/animals grown for genetics. the plants/animals grown for products aren't bred back into the production system, because the first generation vigor is gone and the offspring are going to have a mix that would be difficult to manage genetically. and this is really only for very energy intensive production systems where they are pulling out all the stops to maximize the amount of animal product (or plant product) coming from an individual animal, which is the mindset of industrial systems.