Al Amoudi

"This apparent rush to lease so much farmland, much or all of it to foreign interests, during a time of worsening food insecurity should raise concern within the donor community about GoE motivations and negotiating capacity," writes the US embassy in Addis Ababa in December 2009

Al-Amoudi's recently established Saudi Star Agricultural Development Plc requested, two weeks ago, an additional 250,000 ha of land in Ethiopia for sugar beet production.

Ethiopia's potential can be maximized only if we Ethiopians are the producers and sellers of our own agricultural products. What Meles Zenawi is doing now is putting this upside down. He made our potential buyers the sellers of our commodity.

Sources close to Al-Amoudi said that the king has shown an interest in seeing other Saudi companies involved in rice farming after seeing the samples presented by Al-Amoudi

There’s a whole school of economic thought that says that Collier is wrong, that big is not necessarily better in agriculture — and that the land deals therefore might be unwise not because they’re wrong but because they’re unprofitable.

Un forum Arabie Saoudite/Afrique de l’Est s’est tenu le 15 novembre à Addis Abeba auquel assistaient le ministre saoudien du Commerce et des représentants d’une cinquantaine de compagnies saoudiennes.

The Ethiopian government says concerns about foreign investors exporting food are outweighed by the plantations’ capacity to bring the country foreign exchange and technology, as well as creating employment.

Al Amoudi has a new company whose purpose is to grow food in Ethiopia for Saudi Arabia.

In June 2009, the Indian company Karuturi took up intensive farming in Ethiopia. The harvest will be exported to Asia and Europe.

Indiens et Saoudiens sont sur le point d’effectuer leur première récolte sur sol éthiopien. Le pays a prévu de céder 2,7 millions d’hectares aux étrangers.

King Abdullah received today Saudi Arabia's Minister of Commerce and Industry accompanied by two Saudi businessmen Mohammad Hussein Al-Amoudi and Abdullah Hassan Al-Masri on the occasion of the arrival of the earliest produce of their rice to the Kingdom.

In the largest single agricultural investment, Ethiopia’s richest man Sheik Mohammed Hussein Ali Al-Amoudi, joined the bio-fuel sector in a joint venture with Jemal Ahmed, one of the biggest edible and palm oil importers in the country.