A net-zero land rush is sweeping the country, and both locals and wealthy “green lairds” are trying to buy in

Dutch flower growers who dominate the flower farms in Kenya are being accused of avoiding taxation while proudly wearing the “fair trade” badge.

Olam Nigeria, in a bid to showcase its contributions to the rice revolution in Nigeria, took some journalists to its multimillion-dollar rice farm and milling facility at Ondorie, Rukubi in Nasarawa State

Ian Scoones summarises some of the discussion at the PLAAS Cape Town conference on the engagement of Brazil, China and South Africa in patterns of agrarian change.

China’s biggest potential investment in Australian agriculture, a $1 billion high-risk foray in the fabled Ord River irrigation scheme.

When land deals were first proposed, they were said to offer the host countries four main benefits: more jobs, new technology, better infrastructure and extra tax revenues. None of these promises has been fulfilled.

Abu Dhabi's Jenaan Investment owns and leases properties in Egypt and Sudan, as well as leasing land in Tanzania, Ethiopia and the US.

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.

Oil palm plantations have sprung up at breakneck speed across Indonesia’s ravaged hinterlands, eating away at the forests and propelling this country of 250 million to become the world’s sixth-largest emitter of greenhouse gases.

The dispute centers on the community’s entitlement to a proportion of oil palm company PT Anam Koto’s concession under Indonesia’s plasma program.

The spread of giant soybean plantations in the Brazilian state of Bahia threatens tributaries, floodplains and sources of essential rivers such as the Corrente and the São Francisco.

The only long term solution to this terrible disease may lie in forest conservation, the restoration of agroecological farming systems, and the exclusion of agribusiness investment.

Australian agricultural funds manager Laguna Bay Pastoral Company, which acts for North American pension funds, has recently bought eight dairy farms in the Smithton area.

Government structures across West and Central Africa are now “in a bind and divided, with some ministries choosing to hand over natural resources to agribusinesses and mining, and others seeking to protect the rights of their citizens,” according to Andy White, coordinator of RRI

Herakles says it will provide locals with steady work, roads and health care. But critics call the planned plantation, which would cover Fabe and at least 30 other forest villages in Cameroon, a land grab. Special report from Reuters.

Many in India's eastern state of West Bengal worry the central government's decision to allow foreign direct investment in retail trade would incur loss of jobs even farmers' land.

Capital Alternatives, which offers investments ranging from holdings in African agriculture to pop memorabilia, claims it can generate returns of more than 20% over five years on West Australian wheat farms.

The Schmidt Agricola family business is planning a 10,000-hectare cocoa farm in the Brazilian state of Bahia, where similar super-sized cocoa farms are also under development in partnership with large cocoa companies like Cargill and Barry Callebaut.

The company says, once again, that it will expand its current 300 hectares under cultivation to 20,000 hectares

One of the world’s largest palm oil producers, First Resources, appears to have secretly controlled a network of companies that have been clearing rainforests in Indonesia for more than a decade, an investigation by The Gecko Project has found.

The government of Indonesia’s Papua province has recommended that district officials revoke the permits of 35 of the 54 oil palm concessions operating there.

Women in the districts of Bombali and Pujehun, affected by the large-scale land acquisition by multilateral companies have called on the government to ensure inclusiveness in decision- making and good governance of their lands.

Examples of large-scale land acquisitions in Sierra Leone (Addax/Sunbird Bioenergy and Socfin) and the DR Congo (Feronia) call for European and African governments and development banks to stop funding such operations

An administrative court in West Papua Province ruled in favour of a district head who had revoked permits allowing more than a dozen palm oil companies to operate in Indigenous forest areas and turn them into plantations.

Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth charged the Okomu Oil Plc to stop parading the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) certificate as it has not met its requirement.

The Economic Community for West African States has agreed to provide the Foundation for African Development Aid US$25 million to revamp a rice project originally financed by the Libyan African Investment Portfolio.

That palm oil listed in the ingredients of your favorite candy bar or lipstick? More and more of it comes from forest and farmland razed by multinational corporations a world away.

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.

Land grabs essentially allow other regions of the world to export their food insecurity to Africa, or for Western investors to profit from a decade-long trend of steadily increasing global food prices.

The UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights is being invited to visit Indonesia in connection with MIFEE, the Merauke Integrated Energy and Food Project in West Papua, a mega-project of 1.6m ha for agri-business purposes.