Pakistan

Al Qudra Holding, the Abu Dhabi-based investment company, plans to acquire roughly 400,000 hectares of land in the Middle East, East Africa and Far East by the end of the first quarter of next year in a major expansion of its agricultural operations.

Oil-giant Saudi Arabia plans to set up a new investment fund to buy agricultural land overseas in an effort to meet rising food demand in the Middle East’s largest economy, a Saudi official said.

“We are investing in land in Sudan, Pakistan and Egypt to secure food supplies without being at the mercy of market fluctuations,” Dr Rashid Ahmad Bin Fahd, Minister of Environment and Water, said at a conference in Dubai yesterday.

Given its unsuitable climate for agricultural development, the UAE must look abroad if it is to significantly expand its agricultural output. Pakistan could be the perfect partner.

MAP services group’ is in the process of setting up a fund to develop model dairy and livestock farm in Pakistan. The fund will focus on private equity, SME funding and development as well as donor facilitation of project. The company plans to have 10 model farms in Pakistan by the end of 2010.

Gulf banks and businessmen were yesterday urged to invest less money in the real estate sector and turn to food industries.

Sources say that UAE businessmen are considering buying large land holdings and importing food items from Pakistan at 20-25 percent less cost.

One issue reportedly delaying UAE investment in Pakistan is the Gulf state appearing to want “blanket exemption” from Islamabad’s agricultural export policies.

Gobal fund manager Schroders is launching an Agricultural Land Fund, only months after closing its USD 6 billion Alternative Solutions Agriculture Fund due to excessive investor demand.

Both public and private sector investors in the Gulf are also looking at ways to improve local food supplies, by investing in a range of outlets from arable farm land in the Sudan, Algeria and Pakistan to introduce new technology to enhance the local production of foodstuffs and grains, livestock, poultry and fish.

Globalisation has taken yet another twist with some Middle Eastern countries deciding to grow their crops in other countries.

The Dubai-based think-tank Gulf Research Centre, in its food inflation report released last month, noted that agriculture production in the six-member Gulf Cooperation Council’s (GCC) countries is on the decline, and its exposure to unstable global food supplies would increase in the future. It called on the GCC to develop links with countries rich in arable land.