Besides aircraft parts, MBA degrees and sophisticated building designs, Maryland?s exports to China also include those traditional staples ? chicken feet and bull semen.

A decade ago, the folks at Perdue Farms in Salisbury discovered a better way to dispose of the millions of pounds of chicken “paws” produced at the company?s poultry processing plants. They had been selling them for 2 to 3 cents a pound to be rendered for livestock feed, but they found they could get 10 to 20 times that by shipping frozen chicken feet to China, where they are a deep-fried delicacy.