En privé, les officiels éthiopiens reconnaissent l'échec de leur politique d'agriculture commerciale basée sur la location à bas prix d'immenses portions de terres à des firmes étrangères.

Food companies in the North have always purchased land in the global South to produce export crops. What is different today is the unprecedented scale of these purchases and the kinds of crops that are being grown.

A journalist's visit to South Omo, where rights groups say police have raped women and otherwise pressured locals to leave an area tagged to become a huge sugar plantation, was quickly curtailed by authorities.

Indigenous Peoples are being forced to become dependent on aid handouts having lost their land and their ability to produce their own food.

In Ethiopia, some 43 firms have acquired agricultural land but scores of these have already left the sector, while 16 of them are currently under probation.

A manufacturer of a cartons and polythene bags has applied to the High Court in Kenya to wind up cash-strapped Indian flower firm, Karuturi.

The Land Policy Initiative will host a workshop on 30 September to evaluate recommendations arising from a study by Dalberg Global Development Advisors, which has developed a high level strategy and business plan; as well as an M&E framework to guide the implementation of the African Union declaration on land.

It is wondrous how the threat of climate change, a clear sign of the excesses and limitations of advanced economies, could ever become a driver of grand visions of progress in the developing world.

Are the government's large-scale developments in southern Ethiopia forcing local populations to move with the times or just move out the way?

The promoters of Karuturi Global have been forced to increase their pledge towards the lenders by as much as 58% even as the company is trying to stabilise their operations in Ethiopia

Slideshow about controversies around Karuturi's flower farm operations in Ethiopia

L'accaparement des terres comme une forme de néo-colonialisme n'est pas une question de noms et d’origines, mais simplement une question liée à l'expansion mondiale du système capitaliste.

But human rights and environmental groups say private investment has opened Africa to exploitation through land-grabs by foreigners who are exporting crops to meet food and biofuel demands.

California think tank issues double-barreled report alleging Washington, London are willfully ignoring gross violations.

Two new reports from the Oakland Institute show how Western development assistance is supporting forced evictions and massive violations of human rights in Ethiopia.

Indian companies have attracted global controversy for a spate of large land deals across Africa, yet the Indian Export and Import (Exim) Bank has largely steered clear of directly financing land deals.

Africa must be developed in a rush in order to avoid a global food crisis with huge changes, including a confrontation with chiefs, the role of women and the views on collective property, says Danish Minister for Development Cooperation.

Adakah cara lain untuk menjamin ketahanan pangan di samping impor beras? Ada. Yakni ekspansi lahan pertanian ke luar negeri. Amin Subekti, direktur eksekutif ABAC, melontarkan gagasan ini ketika berbincang dengan Gatra pekan lalu.

Sometime within the last century, soil erosion began to exceed new soil formation. Now, nearly a third of the world’s cropland is losing topsoil faster than new soil is forming, reducing the land’s inherent fertility.

The AU supports the acquisition of African farmland by foreign investors subject to the appropriate checks and controls being in place

What is striking is how brazen and unapologetic the New Alliance is in its quest to open up African farmland to an unprecedented wave of industrial-scale investment.

Mozambique’s President Armando Guebuza has rebuffed allegations that land-grabbing has taken place along the Nacala Corridor under the Japanese and Brazilian-supported ProSavana agriculture project in the north of the country.

Ethiopia’s effort to resettle local farmers into main villages while also leasing land to foreign corporations or wealthy Ethiopians has put Gambella under scrutiny for charges of violent forced relocations.

The slow progress of Karuturi Global and similar projects has prompted the Ethiopian government to reassess its policy of leasing vast tracts of land to single investors.

Ethiopia’s government said it won’t cooperate with a probe into whether the World Bank violated its own policies by funding a program in which thousands of people were allegedly relocated to make way for agriculture investors.

DFID documents reveal that, despite denials of funding forced relocations, British cash pays salaries of officials implementing the Ethiopian government's 'villagisation' programme.

The Hindu's Addis Ababa correspondent Aman Sethi has recently written about Indian companies’ involvement in Ethiopia and Mali, and on 19 May he took part in a Q&A session on Facebook on the issue of so-called Indian land grabs in African countries.

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.

Africa is white hot with minerals and land deals in what could be the second scramble for Africa.

Everywhere in Africa the story is more or less the same: communal rights are being grossly interfered with, farming systems upturned, livelihoods decimated, and water use and environments changed in ways which are dubiously sustainable.