A Chinese conglomerate and Australia’s largest beef producer are amongst contenders vying for rights to farm an agricultural area equal in size to 21,000 soccer pitches in Western Australia.

Australia risks losing an opportunity to become a farmyard for Asia, as growing unease over foreigners buying rural land threatens to provoke protectionist policies.

Australia will set up a foreign-ownership register for farm lands, Prime Minister Julia Gillard said on Tuesday, as the government moves to ease public concern over foreign buyers in the agriculture sector.

The new Australian head of Singapore-listed agribusiness Olam International wants to build more partnerships with institutional investors to open up investment in the agricultural sector.

The New South Wales Farmers Association, in Australia, has switched policies to back much tighter restrictions on foreign companies and investment funds buying Australian farmland.

"We have made some fundamental mistakes over the past few years," PNG's Prime Minister, Peter O'Neill, told ABC Radio Australia.

Logging companies in PNG are using special agricultural leases to clear vast tracts of rainforest timber, on the promise of roads and economic development for remote villages. Jemima Garrett investigates.

Derek Byerlee, co-author of a recent World Bank report The Rising Global Interest in Farmland, says world is running out of productive land and foreign investor and corporate land sales are on the rise across the globe.

Hong Kong-listed Chevalier Group is set to emerge as a major supplier of fresh produce to Woolworths and Coles by acquiring a significant share of a leading Australian fruit and vegetable wholesaler and grower.

Former World Bank rural advisor Derek Byerlee to tell conference that fears of a foreign farm land grab in Australia are unfounded.

In debate over large scale investments in agriculture in Australia, there are some broader issues about foreign investment that don’t seem to get talked about enough.

The sale of Cubbie Station to a Chinese-led consortium has divided Australia on the issue of foreign investment.

If there was any doubt that China is desperate for agricultural assets, it has been dispelled by the news that China Investment Corp with its $US190 billion war chest is on the hunt all the way down to chilly Tasmania in search of fresh milk.

China’s giant sovereign wealth fund is looking to make its first significant investment in the Australian dairy industry, as it tries to lock up food ­supplies for its growing middle class.

Laguna Bay Pastoral Company Crop Fund No. 8 is a relatively new player in Australia’s rural property game, backed by the Global Endowment Fund based in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Colliers International estimates about A$4 billion is currently being raised for funds to invest in Australian agriculture, including PrimeAg’s raising of A$125 million in cash for a controversial unlisted A$250 million agriculture fund with Australia’s Future Fund.

Mawashi, Qatar’s livestock company, plans to invest in industrial agriculture and food sources outside Qatar to serve the vision and objectives of the Qatar National Food Security Programme, it was announced yesterday.

It is understood the agricultural division of the $163 billion Canada Pension Plan Investment Board has been sniffing around Australian agricultural land recently and has had discussions in Australia with landholders such as PrimeAg.

The approved sale of sprawling Australian cotton farm Cubbie Station to Chinese interests has sparked a political row as Nationals Senator Barnaby Joyce insists foreign ownership is not in the national interest.

Australia approved a Chinese company's bid for giant (100,000 ha) cotton farm, including entitlements to a massive 537,000 mega litres of water, or enough to fill Sydney Harbour.

Australians are entitled to test and scrutinise the benefits of foreign acquisitions to ensure they are in our national interest and, importantly, safeguard Australia’s role in global food security.

It is expected that the final report of the Commission of Inquiry into Special Agricultural and Business Leases (SABLs) will shortly be tabled in Papua New Guinea’s national parliament, but no one yet knows what it will recommend, let alone whether Peter O’Neill’s new government will act on those recommendations.

Politicians and economists say that the Australian public is only worked up about foreign ownership of agricultural land because the community is misinformed. This drives the belief that a register of foreign land holdings will calm everyone's anxiety. Given that Queensland has had such a register for 20 years, and that disquiet about foreign ownership still resonates among Queenslanders, this means that something else is at play.

Leading Australian economists, commentators and even political enemies have joined the federal Minister for Trade and Investment Craig Emerson in condemning Opposition plans to tighten control over foreign investment.

Australia's conservative opposition on Friday earmarked tighter scrutiny of foreign investment in agriculture as a priority if the party is elected to government next year, as recent polls suggest.

There's growing interest in who invests in Australian companies and who buys Australian land, with more discussion around the topic of global food security.

A Chinese property conglomerate is bidding for a 15,000 hectare farming project in the Australian outback as Canberra looks to open the remote north for farming to tap booming demand for food from Asia, especially China.

The Cambodian government has cancelled a 14,981-hectare concession in the Cardamom mountains granted to an Australian firm for a banana plantation.

Controversial foreign investment in Australian farming land is here to stay and is vitally important to the future of food security, the federal government says.

The situation in Indonesia, where only a fraction of development projects associated with these transactions are ever implemented, is significant for wider discussions about ‘land grabbing’ around the world.