Bahrain

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.

A number of Gulf states have expressed interest in livestock and rice farming in Thailand to secure food supplies, a Thai official said on Monday. "The countries involved could be Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar or the UAE," he added.

CNN's John Defterios takes a look at how Middle Eastern countries are scouring the globe for farmland.

Pakistan hopes to attract more than $10 billion of investment from oil-rich Arab Gulf countries this year to help develop the country's infrastructure, a senior government official said Saturday.

The Philippines and Bahrain have begun discussions on a possible agribusiness project in Mindanao covering an initial area of 10,000 hectares that is expected to create some 20,000 jobs, officials of the Department of Agriculture (DA) said on Wednesday.

The Philippines and Bahrain have started talks on an agribusiness project in Mindanao that government hopes would generate 20,000 jobs.

The issue of food security is getting higher on Riyadh’s priority list.

The Federal Minister of Investment in Pakistan, Waqar Ahmed Khan, said this week that the government plans to sell or lease 1 million acres of farmland to foreign investors, primarily from Saudi Arabia and other Gulf countries. Although the news has yet to gain much coverage, if carried out it could punctuate growing unrest and frustration, given Pakistan’s limited amount of arable land and population of more than 170 million.

A cash-strapped Pakistani government plans to sell or rent one million acre land to foreign countries for agricultural purposes in a bid to underpin the country’s troubled economy. “A complete legal cover will be provided to the investors so that even in case of the change of government, they should not be affected.”

Pakistan is offering one million acres of farmland, protected by a special security force, for lease or sale to countries seeking to secure their food supplies, an official from the ministry of finance said on Monday.

Vision3, the promoter of AgriCap, the investment vehicle conceived to invest in visionary initiatives across the agriculture sector in the greater MENA region announced today that it signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the General Directorate of Agricultural Enterprises (TIGEM), a Turkish governmental agency falling under the authority of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs.

Bahrain and Turkish trade links took a step closer yesterday with the signing of an agreement for an agricultural project initially worth $0.5bn (BD189 million), rising to $3bn (BD1.13bn) and eventually $6bn (BD2.26bn), said Industry and Commerce Minister Dr Hassan Fakhro at the signing ceremony.