Vita Grain Group, which is backed by US $60 million of funding, owns more than 20 different strains of hybrid rice seeds. Vita Grain is looking for funding to expand its seed production beyond Africa to Asia, the US and South America. The company is also setting up a rice mill in Mauritius and is in talks with partners in Botswana, Madagascar and Mozambique to develop rice production units.

China's sovereign wealth fund, China Investment Corp, has bought a 14.5 per cent stake in grain trading and production firm Noble Group for US$850 million.

Sime Darby Plantation Sdn Bhd is exploring opportunities in other African countries besides Liberia for its palm oil business expansion.

China's $200 billion sovereign wealth fund has added privately-held commodities trader Glencore International AG, which also controls around 300,000 ha of farmland, to its roster of approved investment partners as it deepens its access to global raw material markets, two sources familiar with the matter told Reuters

Civil society, including African farmers unions, need to educate local people that such land deals are not in their interests, however couched in 'win-win' terminology they appear to be.

La COPAGEN mobilise pour arrêter la course effrénée vers l’expropriation « légalisée » des terres avec la complicité de certains décideurs

Sheik Mohammed Hussein Ali Al Amoudi, the second richest person in Saudi Arabia, is preparing to farm cereals on hundreds of thousands of hectares of Ethiopian land for export to Saudi Arabia

Un document interne, récemment mis en ligne sur le site web de l’IRRI, révèle que l’Institut a conseillé l’Arabie saoudite dans le contexte de sa stratégie d’acquisition de terres agricoles à l’étranger pour sa propre production alimentaire.

The Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) has launched a venture aiming to invest in food production worldwide focusing on the acquisition and development of existing agribusiness companies rather than the lease of large tracts of farmland.

An internal document recently posted on IRRI's website reveals that the Institute has been advising Saudi Arabia in the context of its strategy to acquire farm land overseas for its own food production.

Pursuing its strategy of penetrating the Middle East market, the company has set up a special committee to study the possibility to increase exports to the region. So far, the company has signed a farming contract with Bahrain for supplying food products.

"They are selling off African land for a song," said Ndiogou Fall, president of the executive committee for the Network of Peasant Organizations and Producers in West Africa (ROPPA), which is calling for dialogue between governments, producers and African and foreign investors.

"On brade les terres africaines. On contraint des milliers de petits producteurs à la misère. Cela est insupportable. La terre doit rester un patrimoine de la communauté en Afrique", affirme ainsi le président du Comité exécutif du Réseau des organisations paysannes et des producteurs agricoles de l'Afrique de l'Ouest (ROPPA), Ndiogou Fall.

Laos has approached Thailand as a partner in a joint venture with Kuwait to grow rice in Laos. The Lao government has allocated 200,000ha.

Il faut être extrêmement attentif à ce que la dimension Nord-Sud n’en vienne pas à occulter ce qui, dans ce phénomène, constitue la dimension principale : le risque de tension entre les intérêts des élites des pays hôtes des investissements et ceux des communautés locales que ces investissements affecteront le plus directement dans leurs moyens d’existence – petits paysans, populations indigènes, éleveurs de bétail.

A new breed of colonialism is rampaging across the world, with rich nations buying up the natural resources of developing countries that can ill afford to sell. Some staggering deals have already been done, but angry locals are now trying to stop the landgrabs

For investors like Susan Payne, the chief executive of Emergent Asset Management, farmland in sub-Saharan Africa is a hot bet.

The social consequences of these land grabs are significant.

“It is the height of stupidity for our country to bargain our lands for the sake of other nation’s food security, while being dependent on importation for our very own food security needs,” says Rafael Mariano

There may emerge a situation when Ukrainians will be starving in spite of having the most fertile black earth.

Ouyang Riping, PDG d’une société agricole chinoise, a une mission : transformer le Sénégal en grenier à sésame… pour la Chine ! Dakar lui cède 60 000 hectares pour cultiver et exporter le sésame vers Pékin. En échange, les chinois apprennent aux paysans sénégalais à obtenir deux récoltes de riz par an. Coopération originale ou marché de dupes ?

Africa’s agrarian questions are not adequately addressed by simply asking, “What is the role of African smallholders?”

"Nous pouvons être expulsés à n'importe quel moment. Ils vont devoir assécher la zone et tout ce qu'il nous restera sera la pauvreté". Bernard Onyongo, pêcheur de 65 ans, voit son mode de vie menacé par la ruée sur les terres arables africaines.

Le G8 entend mettre un peu d'ordre et de principes dans la ruée mondiale sur les terres arables des pays du sud, à défaut de pouvoir s'immiscer dans les transactions qui privent les populations des terres dont elles dépendent.

A focus on agricultural productivity should not become a cover for foreign private companies to grab land or impose expensive, input-intensive methods in the name of modernisation.

We challenge the line agencies, legislators and national government to immediately stop the leasing of public land to foreign corporations. Instead, public lands that have huge potential to ensure food security and nation building should be distributed to Filipino small farmers.

Le gouvernement du Cap-Vert a créé une société anonyme à capitaux publics en vue d’exploiter et gérer des terres agricoles mises à sa disposition par les autorités angolaises dans le cadre de la coopération entre les deux pays

If Indonesia decides to go ahead with leasing farmland, it should do so with caution, keeping an eye on both the risks and the opportunities. We need to understand that we have a very strong bargaining position.

Contrary to past trends, countries in the Global South are initiating much of the investment.

Uganda's minister of agriculture literally pleaded with the agribusiness delegates at a forum in Capetown to take advantage of Uganda’s extremely advantageous deals for private investors in the agricultural sector.