They go together like ham and eggs – literally. An American hog farmer and an Asian egg producer will invest a total of $1.8 billion on a biogas venture to be based in the United States, and to be operational by year-end 2012.

The agreement was signed on February 16 in Des Moines, after China’s Vice President Zi Jinping toured corn and soybean fields owned by U.S. foods conglomerate Smithfield Foods, Inc., one of the two principals in the deal. The Chinese statesman had met with U.S. President Barack Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, and other senior cabinet officials in Washington, D.C., two days earlier, on February 14.

China's Xinhua news agency reported that Virginia-based Smithfield and Beijing-based DQY Agriculture Technology Co. plan to use waste from a pig farm operated by Smithfield’s livestock production subsidiary Murphy-Brown, LLC, to produce 3.5 million cubic meters of methane a year and to generate 1 megawatt (MW) of power. The project will be able to produce 7 million kilowatt hours (kWh) of electricity and to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by 42,000 tons annually.

What’s more, in the long-term, the goals are much more ambitious. Over the next 10 years the project managers plan to incorporate waste from all 2,600 Smithfield pig farms into the biogas initiative –facilitating the reduction of CO2 by 21 million tons annually – four times the current yearly emission of Chicago, according to DQY.DQY Agriculture Technology Co. and Smithfield Foods will set up a joint venture to be operated by their subsidiaries, Beijing Helee Bio-Energy Technology Co., Ltd, or HELEE and North Carolina-based Murphy-Brown, LLC, The joint venture will adopt core technologies and experience from HELEE’S current biogas operations, located at Beijing Songshan National Nature Reserve.

HELEE’s existing biogas production facility uses chicken manure and sewage to produce 6,600 tons of solid fertilizer, 70,000 tons of liquid fertilizer, and 14 million kWh of power each year. The United Nations has identified the HELEE plant as the “world's largest biogas power generation technology demonstration project.”

Keira Lombardo, a spokeswoman for Smithfield Foods, did not quantify the cost to Smithfield but wrote in an email to the Smithfield, Virginia, PilotOnline on February 17, “Smithfield is excited to be working with Beijing DQY Agriculture to explore technology aimed at developing renewable energy and expects that the project will require an insignificant investment on the part of the company.”

In related news, on the same day when the joint venture between DQY and Smithfield was sealed, China’s Vice President Zi Jinping also was on hand to see China’s Minister of Agriculture Han Changfu and U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack sign an historic Plan of Strategic Cooperation that will guide the two countries' agricultural relationship for the next five years.

The plan was signed as part of the U.S.-China Agricultural Symposium held at the World Food Prize Hall of Laureates, also in Des Moines. The symposium focused on bilateral cooperation in the areas of food safety, food security, and sustainable agriculture; as well as enhanced business relationships between the two countries.

“This symposium and plan are a product of a vision I share with my dear old friend Minister Han for the United States and China to work more collaboratively in the future to benefit our nations and agriculture around the world,” Vilsack said.

“This plan builds on the already strong relationship our nations enjoy around agricultural science, trade, and education. It looks to deepen our cooperation through technical exchange and to strengthen coordination in priority areas like animal and plant health and disease, food security, sustainable agriculture, genetic resources, agricultural markets and trade, and biotechnology and other emerging technologies,” he added.