19/12/05 (Asia Pulse)  BEIJING - China's soybean import has slowed down somewhat due to the influence of bird flu outbreaks in some areas of the country.

Customs statistics show that soybean import delivery in the first ten days of December was only 0.69 million tons, with the monthly delivery likely to be less than 2 million tons, slightly less than the figure for the same period of 2004 which stood at 2.09 million tons.

China's soybean import in January-November hit 23.98 million tons, including 2.56 million tons in November.

Soybean inventory in China is now ample, and extracting volume nationwide is now at a lower than normal level due to the effect of bird flu.