“MPs want ActionAid to keep off”, screams the caption of a story in the East African Standard of January 3, 2006. The story is attributed to MPs Oburu Odinga and Ayiecho Olweny who claim that the NGO is inciting residents of trouble ridden Yala Swamp rice scheme in which American investor Dominion Group of Companies has been embroiled in a tussle with the community over issues of land dispossession

"Economic development is spurring a land grab in broad areas of the country, and the poorest Lao are paying the price," reports the US Embassy in Vientiane

Three Japanese firms, including two on the Fortune magazine's world top 500 list, have jointly leased 100 hectares of farmland in east China's Shandong Province, to become the first foreign investors in China's farming industry.

Hundreds of farmers in Northwest China are expected to toil the soil in the neighboring Republic of Kazakhstan next spring. "We have signed a deal with Kazakhstan to rent 7,000 hectares of land in Alakol county for use for 10 years," a local agricultural official said.

In other African countries, including Ghana, South Africa and Togo, the China State Farm and Agribusiness Corporation (CSFAC) has founded 11 agricultural production, processing and sales projects, and runs a total of 16,000 hectares of farmlands

From the California wine country to the Florida citrus groves and Montana ranches, a wave of Japanese investment is sweeping through American agriculture and food processing.