Romania

Romanian officials have started to express worries about an increasing number of foreign companies buying agricultural land in Romania.

L'agriculture roumaine intéresse de plus en plus les investisseurs étrangers. Les autorités sont en train de s’en rendre compte et souhaitent prendre la situation en main.

Around one million hectares of Romania’s farmland are in foreign hands, and the interest in investing in agricultural plots is growing.

Multinationals, foreign entrepreneurs and investment funds eying Romania as a place to develop have either bought up land as a place to develop agriculture, lease or land bank.

Several national companies and even the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, the capital's sovereign fund, are planning investments in agriculture in countries as diverse as Vietnam, Cambodia, Pakistan, Australia, Romania and the United States.

More than 20 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, a gulf still exists between farm prices in eastern and western Germany which provides a "good opportunity" for investors, a boss at KTG Agrar has said.

"As more investors look into the opportunities that developed nations present there will be no need to go underground or be ashamed of these deals," said Hakan Agro's Tomar.

But company says it does not want to tarnish Saudi Arabia's image by buying farmlands abroad

Ingleby Agricultura, controlled by the Rausing family, paid EUR 8.2mn for purchasing 2,000ha of arable land in Western Romania from Danish company FirstFarms

The fund is in the process of leasing 50,000 hectares of land in Tanzania which will be complete by the end of this year and will mainly be for rice production.

A private sector fund worth $350 million plans to launch by the end of the year in the Gulf, with the aim of acquiring farmland in Romania, Moldova and Tanzania

What started as a government drive to secure cheap food resource has now become a viable business model and many Gulf companies are venturing into agricultural investments to diversify their portfolios.