Australians will get a chance to own a 20 per cent stake in the country's largest landholder, S. Kidman & Co, alongside large Chinese investors, after a deal was struck this week to buy the iconic cattle business for more than $370 million.

The Australian government is deferring until after an upcoming federal election a politically sensitive decision on whether to allow the sale of one of the country's biggest cattle empires, S. Kidman & Co, to a Chinese-led consortium.

The Australian operating arm of Shanghai CRED, known as Shanghai Zenith, has agreed to purchase eight properties in the Goldfields, Kimberley and Wheatbelt for around $20 million.

Australia’s largest pastoral cattle empire, S. Kidman and Co., has agreed to be sold to a Chinese-led consortium for 370.7 million Australian dollars (US$287.3 million), continuing a flurry of deals in the country’s agricultural sector. Earlier proposed deal was rejected by the government last year.

Dakang Australia and Australian Rural Capital say they want to transform S Kidman and Co into a global beef brand

The chairman of Australia's Foreign Investment Review Board has likened his role to walking a barbed-wire tightrope, as he attempts to balance the interests of investors and the need for capital with community concern about foreign sales.

The push to buy Australian farmland and buy into agribusinesses continues to grow, with one report showing an overall jump of $1.9 billion in proposed agricultural investment, year-on-year.

Chinese investors will spend nearly $2.5 billion in agriculture and $1.7 billion in financial assets. In 2014, those were numbers were $32 million and $51 million respectively.

Chinese fertilizer producer Hubei Xinyangfeng has secured its first allotment of farmland outside of China, after it purchased a farm in southern New South Wales, Australia.

A new register of agricultural land will not be made public despite the Government's promise to provide more transparency over foreign investment in Australian farms.

The funds will acquire farms and farmland assets, including permanent crops, arable, and pastoral farmland, and lease to experienced operators across the focused geographical regions of Australia and New Zealand.

While most of the big corporate money has been falling over itself to buy into Australia's largest landowner, S. Kidman & Co, Rifa has quietly bought a total of seven properties in the last few months.

The Qatar backed agricultural land and food producing company Hassad has defended its financial record in Australia following a report which showed its property company had never made a profit.

The four farms in the ‘macadamia capital of Australia’ cover 545 ha across four adjoining farms with 109,000 mature trees and were put up for sale in 2013 by one of the largest institutional managers of agricultural real estate in the US, Hancock Farm Company.

“I find it peculiar that a nation that is the venue for so much flow of funds from overseas to invest in our agricultural assets is not the same venue for Australian super funds to invest in,” ag minister Barnaby Joyce says.

Hassad Australia, the $469 million agricultural land company owned by Qatar's sovereign wealth fund, has delivered a $3.46 million loss and is yet to make a profit since beginning in Australia in 2010.

The $US866 billion financial services giant TIAA expects there will be at least $US100 billion invested in timberland operations and agriculture across the world in the next 10 to 20 years

An Australian investment company has joined forces with a leading Chinese bidder for the iconic Kidman pastoral empire.

Pressure is mounting on Australia's superannuation funds to invest in agricultural land as investors protest about the industry's decision not to try and buy Australia's largest landholder S Kidman & Co.

Australia's deputy prime minister on Tuesday urged the country's A$1.8 trillion (US$1.3 trillion) pension fund industry to boost its investment in agriculture as the sector gears up to meet strong demand from Asia.

The deadline for registration of foreign interests in agricultural land in Australia is fast approaching.

There are fresh calls for closer scrutiny of “who owns what” amid concerns baby formula and dairy product prices could soar after Treasurer Scott Morrison rubber-stamped the sale of Australia’s biggest dairy farm to Chinese business interests.

A Chinese investment firm has won approval to buy Australia's oldest dairy farm, making it the first overseas company to be subject to new rules aimed at ensuring foreign companies pay tax on their Australian earnings.

Mr Hornibrook, who was a former head of Macquarie Agricultural Funds Management, along with some members of his sales team, were found to have extracted sensitive commercial information from a rival fund.

Australian banking giant ANZ has come under fire for its response to a scandal over its financing of a sugar plantation previously linked to forced evictions and child labour in Kampong Speu province.

​Almost two years ago Oxfam revealed that Australia’s Big 4 Banks — the ANZ, Commonwealth Bank, NAB and Westpac — are backing agriculture and timber companies linked to land grabs in developing countries.

Chinese investment company Genius Link Asset Management has trumped rival Shanghai Pengxin’s bid for the S. Kidman & Co pastoral empire just as the race for the coveted cattle stations nears the final hurdle.

Billionaire trucker Lindsay Fox is making a late bid to keep Australia’s largest outback cattle ­empire in local hands with a push to buy the sprawling S. Kidman & Co stations that are set to fall into Chinese hands.

A Chinese company with strong links to the family of Li Ka-shing, one of Asia’s richest men, is on the verge of securing farms covering almost 70,000ha after the biggest single offering of freehold land in Western Australia’s history.

Chinese investors are buying up macadamia orchards in Queensland and New South Wales to protect their own supply