The most recent U.N. demographic projections show world population growing to 9.3 billion by 2050, an addition of 2.3 billion people. Most people think these demographic projections, like most of those made over the last half-century, will in fact materialize. But this is unlikely, given the difficulties in expanding the food supply, such as those posed by spreading water shortages and global warming. We are fast outgrowing the earth’s capacity to sustain our increasing numbers.

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.

A global food crisis and rapid population growth are making farmland an increasingly attractive investment. Holly Black looks at the options.

“There is no villagization programme,” Sai Ramakrishna Karuturi, founder of Karuturi Global, told Mint via telephone. “This is a completely jaundiced western vision. They assume anything in Africa has to be done by the whites and the Chinese and Indians should have businesses only in their own countries.”

Gulf nations need to step up investments in African and South East Asian farmland if the region is to play its part in averting a global food crisis, agriculture experts say.

The World Bank is marching ahead with plans to facilitate global land grabs, while not releasing a report that confirms the negative impacts of these deals for local communities.

The global rush to acquire agricultural land in bountiful Africa evokes concern and protests.

Despite criticism for Chinese efforts to acquire large-scale farmland in Africa, China is seen continuing to aggressively pursue acquisitions in other countries. says Michael Whitehead, executive director of the food and agribusiness research and advisory unit at Rabobank International.

Film maker Gabriela Cowperthwaite uncovers a massive global scheme to gobble up resources, pairing with the Center for Investigative Reporting to bring these shadowy operations to light.

Large institutional investors are pouring capital into global agricultural markets, and Australia has been a key target.

Citic Agri Fund, an investment vehicle created by China’s largest conglomerate, has chosen Brazil as the platform for its global strategy in agriculture.

International funds want to invest in New Zealand farming as part of the global trend to secure food production for emerging Asian economies

Emerging regional powers’ in the South have produced powerful finance capitalists such as the Egyptian firm, Citadel Capital. Allied with global governance institutions, such firms represent greater control over vital resources and distribution routes for private wealth accumulation

With a need to import 100m tonnes of grain each year by 2020, Beijing needs to invest in global agricultural markets, experts say

Investors are pouring into farmland in the US and parts of Europe, Latin America and Africa as global food prices soar.

Across Africa and the developing world, a new global land rush is gobbling up large expanses of arable land.

A discussion note prepared by FAO, IFAD, UNCTAD and the World Bank Group to contribute to an ongoing global dialogue.

After focusing for decades on oil, metals and minerals, Japan's huge trading houses are turning to agricultural commodities, with Tokyo enthusiastically supporting the shift amid concerns about local and global food security .

Arab Economic, Development and Social Summit to be held in Kuwait next month would focus on the global financial crisis, infrastructure in the Arab world and social issues, coordinator general for the summit said on Tuesday.

Some of the world's richest nations are coming to grow crops and export the yields, hoping to turn the global epicenter of malnutrition into a breadbasket for themselves.

Once committed largely to perceived safe-haven investments in the United States, Gulf nations are now looking to send their petrodollar surpluses towards a more exotic global destination: Southeast Asian farmland.

Rattled by rapidly rising global grain prices, China is looking at strategies to ensure long-term food security for its 1.3 billion people such as procuring farmland overseas and opposing the formation of any international grain price-fixing monopolies.

Chinese firms investing overseas receive strong financial support from the Chinese government, which sees Africa and agriculture as important to China’s ‘Go Global’ drive

Even though Peru is not a major player in the global palm oil market, according to some statistics, it is the country where this crop is expanding the fastest.

A new website has been launched this week to monitor the devastating impact of illegal large-scale commercial agriculture as a driver of global deforestation.

Two Southeast Asian countries, Myanmar and Cambodia, have declared to participate in the global rice business through foreign investors from Middle East, China, South Korea, Japan and Thailand.

Olam has snapped up a diverse global portfolio of assets that includes rice farms in Nigeria, almond orchards in Australia, dairy operations in Uruguay and coffee plantations in Laos.

The takeover of peoples' land and water by corporations – even if they are from the global south – is a new form of colonisation, writes Anuradha Mittal.

The science and environment author discusses a growing global threat

Investment by Indian-owned Karuturi Global has raised questions about whether Ethiopia is literally giving away the farm, or conversely, launching a 'green revolution' to help Ethiopia feed itself.