Daewoo Logistics, the South Korean company, said on Wednesday that it was confident that Madagascar’s new government would support a plan to lease a huge tract of farmland on the island to grow food crops to send back to Seoul.

The Saudi Binladin empire has frozen its plan to invest $4.3 billion in developing rice crops in Merauke in Papua Province and a separate project in Southeast Sulawesi Province.

A meeting called to address the problems facing Karuturi flower farm in Naivasha, Kenya, was cancelled. The farm directors who had flown in from India kept off the venue of the meeting due to the anger of union officials and the farm workers

The agricultural arm of the $US487 billion Teachers Insurance and Annuity Association has snapped up six farming properties from listed company PrimeAg Australia in a deal worth $36.7 million.

The UN Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad) said that so far trade and investment deals with partners in the south are merely reinforcing a long-standing trend with the north in which African countries export farm produce, minerals, ores, and crude oil, and import manufactured goods.

The UAE is looking to Azerbaijan to increase its food security as the two countries signed an agreement that helps pave the way for co-operation in both farming and industry.

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.

Pakistan has in principle approved 28 projects worth billions of dollars that would be offered to Gulf countries, including an 85,000 acre corporate farming project in the Cholistan desert.

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.

Academics and business figures gave a grim warning at the Resource 2012 conference, but defended the Rio+20 outcomes

Foreign ownership of watersheds or agricultural land plays into the perennial food security fears that are common in a nation forced to import about 60 per cent of its food.

Hassad Food knows how to shop. The $1b subsidiary of Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund finalised a $500m agreement last year to grow wheat & rice on 100,000 ha in Sudan and has announced plans to invest $700m worldwide this year.

The Government is considering the purchase of farmland worth US$500 million (Dh1.8 billion) in Pakistan as part of a strategy to lower food import costs.

Big financial institutions rake in profits bankrolling the destruction of the land, homes and livelihoods of communities who have safeguarded their forests for generations

European Union (EU) corporate and financial entities involved in land grabbing may be implicated in a variety of human rights abuses.

A controversial foreign investment to produce agrofuels for Europe on 20,000 ha in Senegal has angered communities and sparked violent clashes between peasants and the police.

The idea of combining the greed of investors with the fight against hunger as a mutually beneficial business venture has failed miserably

Investments by the World Bank's IFC in financial intermediaries are alleged to have financed 'land grabs' in South East Asia and violations of indigenous people's rights in Honduras.

US investors are increasingly looking to purchase farmland with their retirement funds to take advantage of the tax benefits of a Self-Directed IRA LLC

A consortium of Saudi groups - comprising dairy giant Almarai, grain importer Al Rajhi and Salic, the agriculture arm of the country's Public Investment Fund sovereign wealth fund – buys Continental Farmers Group, which has large farming operations in Poland and the Ukraine.

The following report, by independent researcher Anna Bolin, explores the global trends and influences at work behind agriculture mega-projects like MIFEE in Papua.

Between 2000-2011, 68% of all investigated foreign capital to 9 top companies in soy and beef sectors in the Brazilian Amazon was transferred through tax havens. Soy and beef production cause major Amazon deforestation.

IFC financial intermediary investments linked to land grabs and displacement in Africa. CSOs critique proposed changes to IFC lending policies

With the emerging land investments a new set of challenges emerges for the woman farmer.

One of the world's major buyers of farmland is under fire for their involvement in land conflicts, environmental destruction and risky investments. A new report by GRAIN and Rede Social de Justiça e Direitos Humanos presents, for the first time, a comprehensive analysis of Harvard University's controversial investments in global farmland.

Financial services firms are increasingly directing investor dollars into regenerative agriculture and other systemic food projects in the US, although not without risks

A New York company managing the retirement savings of workers in Sweden, the US and Canada is evading Brazilian laws on foreign investment to acquire farmlands from a businessman accused of violently displacing local communities.

Friends of the Earth is running an ethical pension campaign to encourage investors to ask their providers if they invest in land grabbing activities. Emma Websdale spoke with campaigner Kirtana Chandrasekaran to discuss why it is such an important issue.

Dutch Banks ING Group, ABN AMRO, and Rabobank have provided 3.1 billion Euros (nearly US$3.5 billion) to agriculture projects that have led to deforestation, land grab and human rights violations around the world in the last five years, a new report has found.

TIAA is unusual among financial firms for its aggressive pursuit of farmland, paving the way for financial wealth controlled by companies and individuals to takeover and dispossess rural communities of their farmland.