WASHINGTON — Poultry export restrictions to China have been lifted for 17 U.S. states the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service reports through its updated export bans listing.
These restrictions on raw poultry and poultry products stemmed initially from outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza in the affected states that resulted in the ban on exporting to China.
China, a longtime and significant export poultry partner with the U.S., has not been lifting HPAI bans per terms reached with a Regionalization Agreement in 2020. The framework of this agreement, when a HPAI is detected in a state, that state could be reapproved for export after 90 days of cleaning and disinfection after the elimination of the virus in the area affected in the state. China would then have 5 days to review and lift its restrictions.
The states that are now being approved for export include: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and West Virginia. However, only products produced on or after May 15, 2026, from these states are eligible for export to China.
There remain 27 states under Chinese restriction, which includes the major broiler producing states of Georgia, Mississippi and Missouri. These states have recently achieved their 90 days prior for cleaning and disinfection, and APHIS should soon be issuing incident closeout reports for these states.
U.S. poultry industry representative organizations are voicing their approval of these recent decisions and hopeful for a return of robust poultry export trade.
“We hope that China’s willingness to abide by the regionalization agreement that we have with them will get us back to normalized trade with this important export market,” Greg Tyler, USA Poultry and Egg Export Council president and CEO, said.
In 2022, China was the second-largest export destination for U.S. poultry, with approximately $1.1 billion of poultry and poultry products exported to the nation. Of this product, frozen chicken paws were a vital commodity. Chicken feet amounted to more than 85 percent of U.S. poultry shipped to China that year. Due to HPAI restrictions, U.S. poultry exports have been drastically reduced in the past several years.
“China is a major market for U.S. chicken, especially paws, and the lifting of export restrictions and the reinstatement of the regionalization framework is a significant development,” Harrison Kircher, National Chicken Council president, said. “I want to thank the Trump administration, USTR (U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer) and APHIS in particular, for their work in holding China to the terms it agreed to.”
“Restoration of access would have a meaningful impact on export volumes of American chicken,” Kircher added.
More U.S. poultry will be available this year, as broiler, turkey and egg production are all forecast higher in 2026 in the USDA’s May World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) report.
This new poultry market access to China closely follows a recent visit of President Donald Trump to China and meetings with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Through these meetings, it was reported that China will be annually purchasing at least $17 billion in U.S. agricultural products in 2027 and 2028 and prorated for 2026. The White House also mentioned that U.S. poultry exports to China will be resuming from the states determined HPAI-free by the USDA.
