Philippines

Gulf oil producers are considering plans to invest in farming projects in the Philippines to face a steady increase in domestic food demand and reduce a painful import bill, said the region's private sector leader.

"We have our experiences about foreign ownership of land in Mindanao, where Dole and Del Monte controlled hundreds of thousands of hectares of lands, through leaseback agreements, cultivating their raw materials, thus, peasants have been transformed to mere lowly agricultural workers whose rights of their lands have been stripped off," said Antonio Flores, KMP Spokesperson.

KKR said that the company planned to build or acquire up to a further 30 large-scale farms over the next few years.

A memorandum of understanding and cooperation will be signed between the Federation of GCC Chambers of Commerce and Industry and the Philippine Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Sam Pov, a rice farmer in Cambodia’s western Battambang Province, is very worried that his land will be taken over by a foreign investor.

As world population expands, the demand for arable land should soar. At least that's what George Soros, Lord Rothschild, and other investors believe.

African nations are becoming more cautious in selling farmland to foreign investors, with governments paying closer attention to deals that could lead to social unrest, AGRA says

Most Chinese investment in African agriculture is concentrated in southern Africa: Mozambique, Tanzania, Malawi and, increasingly, Angola.

A 23-member delegation composed of government and private sector representatives from the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) headed by its Minister of Agriculture was recently on a mission here to explore investment opportunities in agriculture.

The Philippine agriculture department has assured that the government’s bid to attract foreign investments to farm ventures will not compromise the country’s food security and self-sufficiency targets.

The United Nations says the issue of food security has become one of the world's fundamental challenges. In the Philippines, the government has started looking beyond its borders as it tries to boost domestic agriculture. Many small farmers, however, are not happy about that, as Marga Ortigas explains

A visit last week by Saudi Arabian businessmen could result in $300 million in investments to develop 20,000 hectares of farm lands for commercial crops.