The government will act as a facilitator for private industry to buy land abroad to grow pulses, says India's Agriculture Minister.

New Zealand tightened rules for major international purchases of farmland and will now require buyers to show how an acquisition benefits the nation’s economy.

The Qatari company is about to bring home the first shipment of its own wheat produced overseas, and to start producing its own sugar in Brazil

Hong Kong-based Natural Dairy says it has relodged its application with the Overseas Investment Office (OIO) to buy the Crafar portfolio of farms, and expects approval in the next few months.

The United Nations agency that promotes commerce to fight poverty kicked off a meeting today aimed at finding ways in which trade, investment and technology transfers between developing countries – so-called “South-South” cooperation – can improve farming to boost food security in poorer nations.

As the issue of global food security was being discussed yesterday in Rome by world leaders, a senior UN official here highlighted the need for GCC countries to address their dependence on food imports.

The government of Tanzania has refuted media reports indicating that it has leased out 1000 square kilometres of farmland to South Koreans.

The congress will look at one of the key trends in world rice and other food production, including the "off-shoring" of farm production by several influential countries, including China, South Korea and Japan, he said.

It seems that the mere mention of foreigners about to snap up our farmland to grow rice will make our blood of patriotism boil instantly. Yet, the same hostile attitude has never been detected from the Thai public or bureaucracy when big swathes of farmland are bought by Thai businessmen in order to transform them into housing or industrial estates.

In the Philippines, who is monitoring & regulating these deals? Are they violating people’s rights enshrined in our laws? Will communities succumb to vague promises of jobs & infrastructures? Will the deals really trigger economic growth?

Pakistan hopes to attract more than $10 billion of investment from oil-rich Arab Gulf countries this year to help develop the country's infrastructure, a senior government official said Saturday.

Vietnam Rubber Group, the nation’s largest producer and exporter, plans to plant 200,000 hectares of trees in neighboring Laos and Cambodia, betting on a rebound in global demand in the next decade.

Indonesia will allocate at least 2 million hectares of farm land to joint ventures with Saudi investors to be used mainly for the cultivation of rice, a Saudi newspaper reported on Saturday.

South Korea’s project to transform Madagascar into its breadbasket, branded by some as neo-colonial, came to an abrupt end on Wednesday when the Indian Ocean island’s new president said he would shelve the plan.

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.

‘The small farmers cannot do anything in the face of this giant. We can only cry over the loss of our ancestor’s land, that we have tried to preserve as best as possible,’ says Rindra Andriambola, co-ordinator of the Andasibe red rice Slow Food praesidium.

While I am all for infrastructure projects, the way these large-scale agriculture projects are being conceived leaves a lot to be desired. One, they are shrouded in secrecy. Two, this being Kenya, it is not clear who will benefit most.

The Rohatyn Group , a private equity firm based in New York, is now the largest owner of agricultural land in the state of Michigan, making acquisitions through offshore companies registered in Singapore

EBRD makes a €50 million equity investment in Croatia’s Podravka Group to support the acquisition of Fortenova Group’s agricultural division, which owns 32,000 ha of farmland and pig and cattle breeding farms

Klimat X intends to expand operations in Sierra Leone beyond the 57,000 ha that have been secured to date to at least 100,000 hectares and will transfer the same model to other countries across Africa, starting in Ghana and Liberia

The largest landowners in Serbia are Matijevic Meat Industry, Al Dahra (UAE), Delta Holding, Almex, Login EKO, Coric Agrar, Mile Blagojevic, Elite Agro (UAE), Al Rawafed (UAE) and Nicko, Forbes Serbia reports

After the Ondo State government allocated SAO Agro thousands of hectares in the Oluwa Forest Reserve for an oil palm plantation, it moved into the forest with full force and left trails of blood and devastation.

Farmland purchases by the Harvard endowment contributed to a climate of anxiety, fear, and strain on Brazilian subsistence farmers.

Across the region, people have been harassed, threatened and criminally charged in retaliation for opposing land and water grabs linked to mining, dams and industrial agriculture, cementing the region’s ranking as one of the world’s most perilous for environmental and land rights defenders.

New podcast, in English, featuring Ardo Sow from the Collectif pour la Défense du Ndiaël

Hassad has invested in international institutions and companies operating in the grain, meat, poultry, livestock and fish sectors, in a number of countries such as Australia, Canada, Turkey, Oman, Saudi Arabia, and Sudan.

The Indonesian government has stripped back rules protecting the environment to expedite a plan to ramp up food production through a “food estate” programme. A firm run by allies of the Minister of Defence has positioned itself to profit from the programme and is seeking $2 billion in investment.

An open letter has been sent to the AfDB and Nordic Development Fund, calling on them to take immediate action to address reprisals against a community in Uganda impacted by the Wadelai irrigation project.

A group of Civil society groups in Zimbabwe has told the government to immediately withdraw the Statutory Instrument that legalises the eviction of Chilonga people in Chiredzi to grow feed for a dairy company.

About 66 per cent of conflicts related to palm oil in West Kalimantan in the last two decades have yet to be resolved, according to a report recently issued by the Royal Netherlands Institute of Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV).