"The government has verified and delineated 1.6 million hectares of virgin land suitable for large-scale commercial farming in different parts of the country," Esayas Kebede, Director of the recently formed Agricultural Investment Support told Reuters.
India's edible oil industry, which has been trying over the past couple of years to venture into oilseeds cultivation in Paraguay and Uruguay, but could not make much headway due to high cost of finance, is charged up again to take fresh initiatives to realise the dream project.
The Confederation of Indian Industry disagrees with critics of India's foreign landgrabbing for agriculural production
Visit to a 2000 hectare farm in Uruguay on July 4, 2009 with Vinod Surana, CEO of Surana and Surana and leader of CII delegation from India visiting Argentina and Uruguay on June 29 - July 3, 2009
Corporate pitch from Uruguay-based private equity firm Allied Venture for Indian investors to go into outsourced agriculture in Latin America
Allied Venture promo video for Indian investors
I wonder how many other behind-the-scenes transactions are currently underway in the continent that will only be announced when the deals have been signed and perhaps money has exchanged hands.
India, once the colonial jewel of Britain's empire, has been accused of 'neo-colonialism' in Africa where its business people have joined a race with China, Saudi Arabia and elsewhere to buy up agricultural estates and take advantage of cheap labour.
I wonder why the people (and more importantly the political leaders and elite) of the African and Latin American countries are not opposing and driving these companies out from within their national borders. The reason is simple. The rich and elite of every country is the real beneficiary of the process of globalisation.
Greg Mason, from the Queensland Department of Primary Industries, says countries and regions facing 'peak water' like China, India and the Arab states are looking to solve food shortages by growing crops in places like the Ukraine and Australia.
Indian firms have signed land deals in Ethiopia, Kenya and Madagascar to produce a range of food crops for export to India.
KS Oils acquires additional 14,000 HA land for oil palm plantations in Indonesia, owning a total of 34,000 ha.
