Morgan Stanley

Global Witness exposes how more than 300 banks and investors back six of the world’s most harmful agribusinesses to the tune of $44bn

Worldwide, farmland is a hot investment area, but it’s also controversial, opaque, illiquid and sometimes relies on local operation that presents a risk of fraud.

Bloomberg's Alan Katz reports on Morgan Stanley's farming venture on the steppes of Ukraine which it abandoned in July 2009. The failed gamble demonstrates how Wall Street firms, in the last gasp of a debt-fueled bull market, strayed further from their traditional businesses to embrace diverse projects with unfamiliar risks.

Land deals, whether as direct purchases or long-term leases, are being brokered in poor countries by advanced capitalist countries and their TNCs

Sous l’œil bienveillant de l’ONU, les grands noms de la finance s’accaparent des régions agricoles entières.

"In any resource sector, if you want to get involved, you always want to be in the upstream. It doesn't matter whether it's mining, whether its oil and gas or agriculture," says ABN AMRO's Tariono.

Los defensores del modelo de poner a producir las tierras desde los gobiernos, inversionistas o grandes corporaciones argumentan que se generan puestos de trabajo, que se hace rendir tierras ociosas y que se producen alimentos. Pero en ese análisis falta el principal elemento. La pobreza en el mundo reside en el campo, precisamente por modelos como éste.

What’s with farming these days? The humble, even if slightly romantic vocation, is attracting a new breed of participants as investing in farmland and agriculture becomes the latest fad in the world of investments.

Hedge funds and investment banks are swapping their Gucci for gumboots as they bet on rising food prices by buying farms.

Soaring agricultural prices, growing demand for biofuels and the growth of the Chinese and Indian economies are leading top global investment banks to buy farmland in a bid to embrace the physical commodities market.