Read the latest by Marcus Noland (pictured), Peterson Institute for International Economics:

American Economic Relations with Asia [immediate download of PDF file]

What's up and what's the hurry?

China's total trade volumes are expected to drop 20% this year largely because of the U.S. recession. Beijing has to keep exports growing to keep workers employed, and it needs commodities to turn into finished goods. China also needs other nations as customers and suppliers—if not the U.S., then Korea, Japan, Australia, and others will do.

Find out what China's strategy is and what the U.S. intends to do to remain competitive here.

In Midwest, U.S.A., we are fortunate to have the Food Export Association which is a non-profit organization that promotes the export of food and agricultural products from the midwestern region of the United States.

The organization has been helping exporters of midwestern food and agricultural products sell their products overseas since 1969, when it was first created as a cooperative effort between 12 midwestern state agricultural promotion agencies and the United States Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service (FAS -- excellent resource).

If you are not familiar with the Food Export Association, you should be. Overlook the notion that you may not be based in Midwest, U.S.A. for you can still learn a lot about producing, selling, buying and marketing food products by visiting the website and downloading a couple of past Global Food Marketing newsletters (PDF files). Here are a few:

• July/August 2009
• May/June 2009
• March/April 2009
• January/February 2009

I particularly like the Q&A section which offers great insights into how to do things -- from shipping frozen food products to finding the right type of representation overseas -- it's all there.