China significantly ramped up its pork imports in the first two months of 2020, bringing in almost 160% more pork products than the same time period in 2019.

Total imports of pork to China reached 560,000 metric tons be­­tween January and February, a 158% jump over the previous year, according to numbers reported by Reuters last week.

China is facing a severe shortage of pork after the fatal pig disease African swine fever devastated its hog herd, reducing...