Ethiopia plans to offer 3 million hectares of land over the next two years for investors to develop large-scale commercial farms, a government official said on Thursday.

Representatives from the Ministries of Agriculture, Commerce and Industry, Finance, and Transportation will participate in a forum on November 14-15 [2009] in Addis Ababa to officially mark the beginning of a cooperative project under which Ethiopia made one million hectares of land available for Saudi private companies to develop.

Land-locked Ethiopia has given Djiboutian President Omar Ismail Guelleh large tracts of land for wheat farming and a lakeside holiday home, officials said on Tuesday.

Elite Agro Projects plans to establish a wheat farm in Ethiopia, where it already operates a flower farm.

Karuturi Agro Products PLC says it is about to recommence the troubled commercial farms it was forced to abandon in Ethiopia, last year, with a new 25,000 hectare lease.

After nearly a year of protests, demonstrators in Ethiopia turned their anger to foreign investors who they blame for occupying land appropriated by the government.

Karuturi Global Ltd., one of the largest investors in Ethiopia’s farm industry, is challenging the termination of its project, claiming the government broke the terms of its agreement with the company.

The construction of a huge dam in Ethiopia and the introduction of large-scale agricultural businesses has been controversial, and finding out what local people think can be hard.

Mercy Corps, a non-governmental aid agency, plans to set up a $10 million private equity fund in Ethiopia to encourage foreign investment, primarily in agriculture.

Indian-listed Karuturi Global, which has leased land in Ethiopia for commercial farming, plans to export cereals, sugar and edible oil to South Sudan and Kenya upon completing cultivation in 2014.

Oakland Institute report exposes how a controversial hydroelectric project in Ethiopia's Omo Valley is facilitating the take over of 350,000 ha of land for sugar cane and cotton plantations and resulting in state-sponsored human rights violations.

This study is conducted in order to shed light on and investigate the welfare situation for people affected by farmland investments. It deals with three cases in the Oromia region: Castel Winery, Elfora Agro-Industries PLC and Sher Ethiopia PLC

Ethiopia’s government ruling tribal junta has defended its plan to offer 2.7 million hectares of farmland to foreign companies despite millions of citizens who need food aid from the international community.

A 15,000-hectare concession awarded to Karuturi Global in Ethiopia’s Gambela region has left locals fearing their ancestral lands will be cleared for agribusiness once again by the Indian firm.

The Ethiopian Horticulture and Agricultural Investment Authority says it is negotiating with Karuturi Global over a request to continue operations in Ethiopia, after long disagreement with the company about its 100,000 hectare farm project in Gambela Region.

The Ethiopian government has embarked on a large-scale land investment policy that has led to the displacement and forced eviction of Ethiopia’s most marginalized traditional societies.

BHO Bioproducts, a closely held farming company, said it plans to invest more than $120 million in rice and cotton production on 25,000 ha in Ethiopia’s western Gambella region during the next four years.

Ethiopia has provided more than 71,000 hectares to 12 Ethiopian and international investors in the previous financial year according to the Ministry of Agriculture.

Gunmen attacked the camp of an agricultural company owned by a Saudi billionaire in southwest Ethiopia, Federal Affairs Minister Shiferaw Teklemariam said.

Study of cases of large-scale land deals in Ethiopia finds range of negative impacts on local families and women in particular, including reduced access to land for farming and grazing, outmigration, and reduced availability of forest products.

The Ethiopian Agriculture Investment Land Administration Agency disclosed that it has provided over 2.3 million hectares of land for investors this Ethiopia fiscal year.

Ethiopia is building huge dams and plantations in the Omo River Valley, displacing its own people in addition to causing lost livelihoods in Kenya.

A violent attack on a tea plantation leased by Indian-owned Verdanta Harvest Plc, a subsidiary of the Noida-based Lucky Group, has renewed concerns over Ethiopia’s policy of leasing out large tracts of land to international investors.

Ethiopia announced on Friday plans to lease 100,000 hectares of land both to local and foreign investors, despite recent reports that foreign investors were grabbing large chunks of land.

Ethiopia has made more than 4 million hectares (9.9 million acres) of “fertile and unutilized” land available for agriculture companies that meet government requirements, Prime Minister Meles Zenawi said.

Ethiopia’s Agriculture Ministry has transferred 100,000 hectares in Benishangul to commercial farmers, and is offering a further 981,000 hectares, about one-fifth of the state’s land.

Two articles on large-scale land investment in Ethiopia examine the implications for smallholder farmers and pastoralists.

A Survival investigation has uncovered alarming evidence that some of Ethiopia’s most productive farmland is being stolen from local tribes and leased to foreign companies to grow and export food – while thousands of its citizens starve during the devastating drought.

This study, published by Misereor and Heinrich Boell Foundation, has given a first regional overview of the development of FDI inflows over the last decade in Ethiopia.

The Swiss-based multinational ASC Impact claims to have acquired 22,000 hectares in Ethiopia’s remote Gambela state along the border with South Sudan for large-scale tree plantations, carbon credits and agriculture.