Over the past year, I have been collecting material on biofuels, land rights in Africa, and global land grabbing. Reading through this material worries me greatly, for it carries very strong echoes of Cecil Rhodes and his merry men.
Jordan's stalled Sudan agricultural investment project is no longer feasible, as no one will pay the infrastructure costs to transport water.
- Jordan Times
-
21 September 2010
Some natives of Tema Manhean have prevented officials of WILMAR, a Singaporean edible oil refinery company, from developing a piece of land near the naval base which was allegedly sold to the company by the Ghana Ports and Harbours Authority.
Du point de vue de GRAIN, ce rapport très attendu de la Banque mondiale est à la fois une déception et un échec.
GRAIN says the World Bank's much anticipated report on the global farmland grab is both a disappointment and a failure.
Michael Burry, the former hedge-fund manager who predicted the US housing market’s plunge, said he is investing in farmland. “I believe that agriculture land -- productive agricultural land with water on site -- will be very valuable in the future.”
- Bloomberg
-
07 September 2010
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 National
-
02 September 2010
Fonterra says it is having a "very close look" at relaunching a processing business in China as it faces a rapidly growing competitive threat from Chinese manufacturing startups with their own large-scale dairy farms.
- Business Day
-
30 August 2010
Nationwide advertisements have been placed in newspapers today, calling for an end to foreign ownership of New Zealand farmland.
Fears foreign interests have been mounting a major land grab in New Zealand, have been shot down by global accountancy firm KPMG.
It is not too late for equitable partnerships to flourish between foreign investors and local communities.
Macquarie Group's agricultural division has launched a new cropping fund that will buy large-scale grain properties in Australia and Brazil.
- Stock & Land
-
16 August 2010
Australia's opposition leader Tony Abbott said his Liberal-National coalition of center-right parties could revise the country's foreign investment laws if it wins power in the Aug. 21 general election.
A group of food security advocates wants a Philippine government-led corporation that identifies new land suitable for local and foreign agricultural businesses abolished.
Africa's untapped agriculture potential make it an ideal partner for resource-constrained Middle Eastern countries that seek to improve their food security, a new report from Standard Chartered Bank said.
- Trade Arabia
-
22 July 2010
A farmland development group backed by Jacob Rothschild is to become the first Brazilian company to list on the Hong Kong stock exchange
- Financial Times
-
18 July 2010
A group of farmers from Punjab are planning to take 1 lakh hectare land on lease in the African nation of Ethiopia for cultivation.
- Sikh Sangat News
-
11 July 2010
Anywaa Survival Organisation's critique of the Ethiopian government's video presentation of rice land grab in the Gambela region.
Private equity firms like Rabo Equity Advisors and IL&FS Investment Managers may be in talks with Karuturi.
Evidence suggests a marked disparity in the benefits received by those involved in and affected by these transnational land acquisitions, particularly for those originally dwelling on the land.
- Brookings Institution
-
25 June 2010
The government of Brazil is studying the possibility of prohibiting the purchase of land by foreigners. A discussion with the journalist who broke the news, Mauro Zanatto.
- El Espectador
-
24 June 2010
Outline of major Ukraine companies open to farmland investors
ILC is actually trying to promote some sort of dialogue between the different proposals for principles for responsible farmland investment
SilverStreet is scouting for commercial farms in five countries — Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.
- Institutional Investor
-
04 June 2010
World Bank's MIGA provides political risk insurance for Chayton Capital's $50 million farmland investments in southern Africa.
An economic analysis of land grabbing in 25 countries by a French securities firm. Predicts the entry of Danone, Nestlé and Unilever into the fray.
- ODDO Securities
-
30 May 2010
Vaughan-Smith and his team of seven professionals are scouting for commercial farms in five countries — Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia — where conditions are deemed to be the most favorable.
- Institutional Investor
-
28 May 2010
Demeter International got a 25-year lease for 10,000 ha of Bwabwata National Park, which it will start ploughing in October. Hundreds of families will lose access to the forest.
Rural people in several parts of Cameroon are protesting a government policy that allows the government to sell or lease vast parcels of arable land to foreign investors.
The Journal of Peasant Studies, in collaboration with the Land Deal Politics Initiative, is organizing an international academic workshop on ‘Global Land Grabbing’ to be held on 6-8 April 2011 at the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, Brighton, UK.