ALBION, INDIANA — Inside a dimly lit barn in northeast Indiana, where the air smells of corn and earth, the future of China’s food supply is squealing for attention.

A farmhand shuffles through the crowd of pigs inside pen 7E3, patting their fleshy pink backs and checking their water trough. The animals here at the Whiteshire Hamroc farm have been bred for one purpose: to be flown halfway around the world, on a journey fueled by China’s need for more food.

In a country where pork is a staple, the demand for a protein-rich diet is growing faster than Chinese farmers can keep up. While Americans have cut back on meat consumption to the lowest level seen in two decades, Chinese consumers eat 10 percent more meat than they did five years ago.

China’s solution: to increase its supply by buying millions of live animals raised by American farmers as breeding stock, and capitalizing on decades of cutting-edge U.S. agricultural research.