Scholar and employee of the UN Economic Commission for Africa, Atkyelesh G.M. Persson, recommends that the government, private sector and academia further investigate the potential damages large scale farms have perpetrated in Ethiopia and beyond.

Ethiopia’s development of Chinese-backed sugar plants in the country’s south, part of a plan to become one of the world’s top 10 exporters, is struggling because of a lack of funding and technical expertise, a research group said.

Businessman claims 50% of Saudi investors in Ethiopia have left the country, some leaving behind their farms and others selling them. He says many do not want to return for fear of being framed for crimes they did not commit.

Commercial farming, with its vast tracts of land, is running into problems in Ethiopia’s Gambella region – and local communities are reaping few benefits

Ethiopia's Agriculture Investment and Land Administration Agency says 3.6 million hectares of arable land is being provided for investors engaged in the agriculture sector.

Karuturi Global faces accusations of causing floods to local villages, not paying taxes, contributing to human rights violations and providing dismal working conditions at its farming operations in Gambela, Ethiopia.

Company looks to tide over land-grabbing allegations, devastating flood for its $300mn project in Ethiopia.

Karuturi expects to acquire 311,700 ha of land in Tanzania that is similar to Ethiopia and has already applied for 1000 ha of land at Rufiji Basin, Coast Region.

"The reports claiming that the Government of Ethiopia has reduced the land concession given to Karuturi Global, are completely baseless," says Sai Ramakrishna Karuturi, Founder & MD, Karuturi Global.

Despite opposition from Ethiopia's President and environmental authorities, a rainforest area providing livelihood to an indigenous people has been leased out to make tea plantations.

Land grabbing poses no harm on the environment or on the local community, says Saudi billionaire Sheik Mohammed Hussein Al-Amoudi who is seeking to expand his farmland in Ethiopia from 10,000 hectares to 250,000 hectares.

Ato Tamiru, chairman of the Gumare Kebele in Gambella, western Ethiopia, and people in his kebele have been protesting the leasing of a large tract of land to an Indian company to be used for tea farming even though there is a severe food shortage in the country.

A group of farmers from Punjab are planning to take 1 lakh hectare land on lease in the African nation of Ethiopia for cultivation.

"Agricultural lands being leased by Saudis have been increasing by the day in Ethiopia," Ethiopian Consul General Tekleab Kebede says.

Ethiopia’s hopes of ushering in a new era of commercial farming ventures rested in large part on the shoulders of the Gambella Regional State. Recent years have seen hundreds of investors granted licenses and credit to establish commercial farms in the southwestern corner of the country, but little has come from the efforts.

High Court says Karuturi's Honorary Consul of Ethiopia status does not provide immunity from tax authorities and says he violated the sanctity of the consulate by carrying on his other business activities on the premises.

Saudi Star Agricultural Development Plc, an Ethiopian company owned by billionaire Mohamed al-Amoudi, said it plans to invest $100 million in a rice farm in western Ethiopia next year to kick-start the stalled project.

Move to seek an extension of AGM date comes after a series of issues it has been facing at its expansive roses farms in Kenya and allegations of land grab at its ambitious agriculture foray in Ethiopia.

Indian companies which invested in controversial deals involving hundreds of thousands of acres of land in Ethiopia have found themselves out of their depth in a fast-growing African economy.

African nations like Zambia, Ethiopia and Mozambique invited Indian investors to invest in various sectors, especially in agriculture, saying this has the potential to provide food to both Africa and India.

According to the evaluation that the ministry did in the past few weeks, some of the large-scale land acquisitions in Ethiopia are not performing as expected in implementing their projects.

Africa is up for sale by the acre to the highest bidder. But how can rice exports from Ethiopia to Saudi Arabia be justified?

Ethiopia's agriculture ministry put an advertisement in its website for 180,625 hectares along the Omo River in southern Ethiopia.

The Development Bank of Ethiopia suspending loans for commercial farms because of the failure of numerous farms in Gambella, where the Bank was even tricked into giving two loans for a single agriculture project.

Arrests of some of Saudi Arabia's richest people includes two businessmen with large-scale farmland investments: Alwaleed bin Talal investing in Egypt and Mohammed Al Amoudi in Ethiopia.

People from Oromiya, a region at the heart of Ethiopia's industrialisation efforts, accuse the state of seizing their land and offering tiny compensation, before selling it on to companies, often foreign investors, at inflated prices.

FT correspondents report on the global race for land from Ethiopia, Myanmar and Indonesia.

Swedish TV4 said H&M was using cotton from areas in Ethiopia vulnerable to land grabbing -- the buying or leasing of land in developing countries, often by foreign companies, without the consent of affected local communities.

On 31 January 2012 in Dubai, 2nd Commercial Farm Africa features panel of experts and in-depth analysis on land utilization & investment policies in Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia, Sudan, Namibia, Ghana and Ethiopia.

"The farmland that we are transferring to foreign investors is not the land that is being used by the locals," asserts Yaregal Aysheshum, former president of the Benshangul Gumuz Regional State in Ethiopia