"Land grabbing" will be featured on the agenda of a high-level conference on the rice industry in November 2010 in Vietnam, where 17 agricultural ministers will be in attendance.
TADCO subsidiary has already arranged leases in Cambodia, Vietnam, Pakistan and the Philippines for export production of aromatic and long grain basmati rice.
Between 2007 and mid-2008, Gulf states and their government-backed businesses spent US$15 billion (Dh55bn) in sub-Saharan Africa alone, much of it in the drive for food security
An increasing number of Indian companies are expected to use Singapore as a springboard for their global operations, including overseas farmland investments
Saudi Arabian investors are looking to expand their agricultural investments in the United States to secure long-term food supply because of water shortages in the desert kingdom, Saudi officials said on Thursday.
But company says it does not want to tarnish Saudi Arabia's image by buying farmlands abroad
Vietnam President Nguyen Minh Triet, current chair of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, pledged to bolster Saudi-ASEAN cooperation in view of ASEAN's reliance on the Gulf states' oil and the Gulf states' need for overseas farmland for their own food security.
Vietnam's president Nguyen Minh Triet on Saturday met Saudi business leaders who asked for flexible investment regulations and access to Vietnam's farmlands
"Qatar is in the process of formulating a national strategy for food security that we expect to shift from a focus on land ownership in developing countries to land leases and joint ventures with the private sector in developed countries," reports the US Embassy in Doha
UAE foreign investment in food production have so far focused on leasing Pakistan and Sudan’s agricultural land, with new prospects in Cambodian rice, Canadian wheat and Australian beef. Alongside the strategic deals at the national level, private investment has followed which should open new channels of trade, for example, Al Qudra Holding has plans to grow grain and vegetables in Vietnam and Croatia as well as Pakistan.
"Our proposition to the governments is that we can help them develop the infrastructure and develop the farmland and we will then take a share of the produce," says KCIC
In a bid to boost rice production, the government of Anambra is to sign a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Vietnam Africa Agricultural Development Company (VAADC) to begin mechanised production of rice.
|
A new wave of land grabs strikes Tanzania
|
