Gulf governments, entrepreneurs and sovereign wealth funds have spent vast sums buying or leasing farmland across Asia and Africa to try to secure cheaper imports and keep supermarket prices low. But the World Bank and UN want them to put more money into development aid.
According to Barclay Hedge, agricultural funds were up 9.5% in 2008, while the S&P 500 index lost 36%.
Arab leaders called for launching an emergency Arab food and water security program, as per the draft resolution of the Arab Economic Summit, Kuna reported.
Even the World Bank is continuing its role as a neo-colonial consensus agent by actively pursuing and financing access to 'under-utilised land' around the world through its International Finance Corporation.
For the practical realisation of the goal of food sovereignty that has been eluding our nation since the time of independence, the importance of genuine agrarian reform and peasants’ rights cannot be underestimated.
Tanzania may find itself on similar a pathway like Zimbabwe where 4,500 commercial farmers own over 90 per cent of arable land including some so-called absent landlords living luxurious lives in London.
Sudan will be proposing wheat cultivation as the first option for its role in Arab and global food security.
Tanri said the government was eager to encourage and provide support to deep-pocketed business leaders from the Middle East to invest in Indonesia.
Lonrho, the pan-African conglomerate listed in London, has secured leasehold rights to 25,000 hectares of rice paddies in Angola and is negotiating two bigger land deals in Mali and Malawi, in another sign of investor appetite for African land.
The Federal Government, yesterday, in Abuja, signed a $16 billion development cooperation agreement which covers real estate, agriculture, power, oil and gas, with the Dubai World Corporation in the United Arab Emirates.
To lure investment dollars, the Sudan government has removed import duties on agricultural equipment being imported into the country.
The Lands ministry has denied any knowledge of an arrangement between Kenya and Qatar to lease 40,000 hectares of its prime farm land to the Arabian country to grow food while over 10 million households face starvation.
