The proposals for farmland acquisitions by countries such as Saudi Arabia or Qatar are at a pre-feasibility stage and no commitment has been made so far, the government of Pakistan told the High Court of Lahore

“Our people have already surveyed several areas to choose the right place for planting basmati rice. The investment will be huge,” says Ambassador Khayyat.

The TCC Group's move to terminate the farmers' leases comes amid increased concerns that foreign firms are taking a controlling interest in rice farms in Thailand's central provinces.

“I would say to friends in the [Gulf] region that this is not the way to get food security because the opposite will happen”, the former director-general of the World Trade Organisation told Gulf Times yesterday.

Lahore High Court Chief Justice Khawaja Muhammad Sharif postponed until October 6 the hearing of a petition challenging the proposed sale or lease of millions of acres of agriculture land to foreign countries.

The Government of Japan, with the World Bank, FAO, IFAD and UNCTAD, try to initiate a coordinated global response to the growing land grabbing trend at the UN

Citadel, which also announced on Tuesday that it was investing in 500,000 feddans (210,000 hectares) of farmland in Sudan, is also looking to potential investments elsewhere in Africa: Uganda, Kenya, Ethiopia.

Egyptian private equity firm Citadel Capital is investing in 210,000 ha of farmland in Sudan, where it got the right to the land for 99 years.

An Afro-Arab agriculture conference on farm investment, which was to take place in Zanzibar, has been cancelled due to the Tanzanian governmnt's 11th hour refusal to host it.

The Solvent Extractors Association, the Indian oilseeds industry body, has formed a consortium of 18 companies to acquire 10,000 hectares of prime farmland in a $40-million deal in Uruguay and Paraguay to cultivate oilseeds and pulses. The association says they are hamstrung only by access to finance, otherwise they have it all sewn up.

IRRI is not involved in any projects on land acquisition for rice production, nor does it provide advice on land acquisition, but it does find ways to help increase the overall rice supply

Key areas of investment interest from pension and sovereign wealth funds in UK, Middle East, Europe and the US include agriculture land in Australia, South and North America, and throughout Europe.