Saudi Arabia

Argentinian Agriculture Minister Norberto Yauhar met last week with Saudi Ambassador Turki M.A. Al Madi to discuss investments that the Kingdom is considering in Argentina, particularly in San Luis.

Saudi Arabia has invested around 40 billion riyals in agricultural and livestock projects in the Ukraine, Brazil, Argentina, Canada and Sudan, says chairman of the agricultural investment committee at the Saudi Council of Chambers.

Food investment outside the GCC states needs to be reconsidered under global variables, particularly political and economic ones that may pose a major threat to the Gulf food security, according to the Federation of GCC Chambers.

Almost 70% of all concluded and planned Saudi investments in offshore agriculture are in Africa, according to a new report from Standard Bank

Dr Fahd bin Abdulrahman Balghunaim, minister for agriculture for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, speaks to This is Africa about the government's strategy in Africa.

Major agricultural investor in Ethiopia, Saudi Star, has bigger problems there than it might have expected.

Saudi Arabia is encouraging companies to invest in farms in Africa as the kingdom seeks to secure supplies of food imports to replace local production, said Agriculture Minister Fahd Balghunaim.

Dar Al-Maskukat Trading of Riyadh has requested a long-term land lease from the Philippines of up to 200,000 hectares of rain-fed government land and private farms to produce rice for the Saudi market.

Saudi Arabia's Ministry of Agriculture wants to hand over the file of foreign agricultural investments to the Saudi Company for Agriculture Investment and Animal Production.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE are among the top four countries on a massive investment spree to acquire agricultural resources.

Sixty years on, controversial agricultural projects are back in fashion in Africa and other parts of the developing world as investors - from foreign governments to wealthy individuals - hunt for land to grow food.

Dalla Al Baraka, a Saudi conglomerate with $5 billion in annual revenue, has acquired two million acres of farmland in eastern Sudan to produce food for export to the Middle Eastern kingdom. While the investors are hoping to wean Saudi Arabia off imports from South America, such agreements cause concern among local Sudanese farmers.