The bird flu outbreak hit China’s poultry consumption and curbed soybean demand. The drop-off in Chinese demand for soybeans used to feed poultry and livestock could last for months, as consumers lose their appetite for poultry. China, which buys 60% of the world’s traded soybeans, could further reduce bean imports this year – already down some 13% year-to-date on food security concerns and high stocks – which will likely curb a rally in benchmark Chicago prices. Poultry sales have dropped by 80% in eastern China and by about 30% in other parts of the country, analysts and industry officials say. Fewer birds to feed means less demand for soybeans and corn. “We don’t see any signs of recovery” for poultry consumption, said Wang Xiaoyue, Analyst at Beijing Orient Agri-business Consultant Co. “There is a possibility of a 20% to 30% decline in consumption this year if the flu lasts for some time.” The price of one-day-old chicks, which poultry farmers buy from breeders to restock, have plunged more than 85%, according to the National Poultry Industry Association. China’s soybean imports had risen for eight consecutive years, rising almost five-fold to 58.39 million tons last year from 10.43 million tons in 2000, driven by rising wealth and demand for high-protein food such as pork, poultry and seafood. China now accounts for half of the world pork consumption and close to 15% of the global poultry production. This year, soybean imports have already dropped more than 13% to 11.49 million tons in the first quarter from a year ago.

China was forced to import wheat to boost state reserves as a result of a deterioration in its massive but ageing state stockpiles. China’s stocks were estimated to be enough to meet demand for six months, but substandard storage facilities have damaged part of the crop, some of which dates back to 2010. Sinograin, the state stockpiler, bought 1 million tons of U.S. soft red winter (SRW) wheat for the next marketing year, traders said. “We expect another 2 million to 3 million tons of imports because authorities are very worried about the volume of deteriorating wheat among state stocks,” said Ma Wenfeng, Analyst with Beijing Orient Agri-business Consultant Co. The government last year removed more than 900 private firms from the list of enterprises allowed to store wheat on behalf of the state. Tight supplies of good-quality wheat have helped drive up domestic prices to a record high, but the increase eased off recently when Beijing began to offer stocks from last year’s harvest at its weekly auctions. China’s wheat imports last year surged to an eight-year high of 3.69 million tons, consisting largely of feed-grade wheat bought to offset corn shortages. Most analysts estimate that the government still holds nearly 20 million tons of wheat from previous stockpiling, a comfortable level given the country’s annual consumption of 115 million tons.

Isolated H7N9 cases have now also been confirmed in Shandong, Hunan and Taiwan. There is still no evidence of sustained person-to-person transmission. Experts do not see the clustered cases in which more than one member of a family became infected as instances of human-to-human transmission. But the virus is one of the most lethal flu viruses ever observed by the World Health Organization (WHO). So far, a total of 125 people have contracted the disease in China with many of those affected having worked with poultry. 24 have died, while some have fully recovered. “Investigations into the possible sources of infection and reservoirs of the virus are ongoing,” the WHO said. “Until the source of infection has been identified, it is expected that there will be further cases of human infection with the virus in China.” Speaking after a five-day study, a panel of WHO-experts described the strain as “one of the most lethal” of its kind and said it was more easily transmissible to humans than an earlier strain, H5N1. Keiji Fukuda, the WHO’s Assistant Director General for Health Security, said: “The situation remains complex and difficult and evolving.” There has been a “dramatic slowdown of cases” in Shanghai, which recorded most of the deaths, said Anne Kelso, Melbourne-based Director of the WHO Collaborating Center for Reference and Research on Influenza. “This is very encouraging at this stage of the outbreak,” she said. After Shanghai closed down its live poultry markets in early April, “almost immediately there was a decline in detection of new cases,” Kelso said.

Chinese researchers have confirmed poultry as a source of H7N9 flu among humans but said they have not found any evidence of person-to-person transmission. A report in The Lancet said a probe into four cases of human H7N9 influenza in Zhejiang province showed that all the patients had been exposed to poultry, either through their occupation or by visiting wet poultry markets. “Nobody else who came into contact with the H7N9-infected patients began to show any symptoms within 14 days from the beginning of surveillance, suggesting that the virus is not currently able to transmit between human beings,” the researchers said in the journal. A leading researcher has called for live-bird markets in H7N9-hit areas to be closed and poultry culled to block the deadly virus’ spread. Taiwan heightened surveillance of travelers from China after authorities confirmed the island’s first case. A 53-year-old man became ill with fever after returning from a visit to Jiangsu province. Taiwanese airlines suspended providing chicken and ducks from China.

Premier Li Keqiang visited the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Beijing, warning people to prepare for new developments amid fears H7N9 could mutate into a form easily transmissible between humans. “Countermeasures have been effective so far, but the situation is still developing as new cases turn up,” Li said. “We cannot afford to take it easy or relax, as we are facing a new virus,” he said. “We should be prepared for any possible development.”

Courts across China handled 83,850 civil lawsuits over intellectual property rights in 2012, up 44.1% year-on-year, according to the IPR white paper of the Supreme People’s Court. In 2012, courts across the country received about 87,420 new civil lawsuits over IPR issues, a year-on-year jump of 46%. More than 60,000 suspects were detained for IPR infringement and producing and selling substandard commodities in 43,000 cases in 2012, with a total value of CNY11.3 billion. The iPad trademark dispute between Apple and Shenzhen’s Proview topped a list of 10 major court cases involving IPR infringement last year. Apple eventually agreed to pay USD60 million to Proview in a court-mediated settlement in July. The court also released 50 typical IPR cases from 2012 and, for the first time, 10 “innovative cases” involving new legal fields or matters, which experts said can be used as a guide on how to handle similar lawsuits. Wang Chuang, Vice President of the Third Tribunal for civil trials said the number of IPR cases involving an overseas party is on the rise, and there is an increase in the number of cases in which transnational companies are accused of infringing the rights of Chinese firms. He also said transnational companies can have full confidence in China’s judicial protection of intellectual property rights because of improvements China has made in recent years.

Intellectual property is an increasingly important part of improving China’s core competitiveness and restructuring its economy, Tian Lipu, Commissioner of the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO), said in a video speech at the launch ceremony for IP Promotion Week on April 26. In 2012 alone, SIPO granted some 217,000 invention patents, raising the number of patents owned per 10,000 people in the country to 3.2. People and institutions filed 688,000 applications to have works copyrighted and registered 139,000 copyrights for computer software, both of which hit a record high for the country. By the end of last year, China’s accumulative trademark inventory had expanded to 6.4 million, enabling the country to hold on to its first-place position in the world. SIPO has grown into the largest office worldwide for dealing with patents and industrial designs, and China’s trade office also ranks first in the world, said World Intellectual Property Organization Director Francis Gurry. “The next generation of creation is going to belong to China,” Gurry said. In some Chinese metropolises, copyright-based industries have contributed more than 10% to GDP, Gurry noted, adding that they are “truly extraordinary achievements”. The week-long campaign was held under the theme of “implementing IP strategy and supporting innovation-driven development”. Tian said he hopes that the events are not only a stage for IP professionals but also a platform for the public to focus on IP issues, the China Daily reports.