As climate change, population growth and environmental damage shrink the amount of arable land on the planet, wealthier countries and corporations look to developing countries for land.
In the country known as the “breadbasket of Europe,” agriculture has been dominated by oligarchs and multinational corporations since the privatization of state-owned land following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Will this change, now that a controversial law to create a land market entered into effect on July 1, 2021?
- Oakland Institute
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06 August 2021
A visit to Mozambique dispels any notion that big business is going to ‘feed Africa’. Hazel Healy reports on a land rush in full swing.
- New Internationalist
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06 May 2013
ILC is actually trying to promote some sort of dialogue between the different proposals for principles for responsible farmland investment
BRICS states, except Russia, are enhancing and facilitating land grabs abroad in a way that is inconsistent with their proclamations of sustainable development, cooperation solidarity, and respect of national sovereignty.
Today, more than a quarter of all the land in Liberia is leased or owned by logging, mining, or factory-style agriculture companies. Nothing is wrong with that — unless you happen to be one of the people who used to live on that land.
- Boston Globe
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20 February 2013
Award-winning Cameroonian journalist Madeleine Ngeunga and Fern’s Indra Van Gisbergen recently visited villages in the shadow of Socapalm’s oil palm plantations to see if issues driving the dispute between locals and the company are being resolved.
While the Law on how to sell and buy agricultural land prohibits foreigners from buying land in Moldova, then the Land Code does not provide such restrictions.
Logging companies in PNG are using special agricultural leases to clear vast tracts of rainforest timber, on the promise of roads and economic development for remote villages. Jemima Garrett investigates.
The government has not presented satisfactory and truthful explanations about its actions, let alone credible defense of its role as agency and facilitator of the abominable practices of farmland grabbing.
- tramnsformingethiopia
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11 August 2011
One of the greatest threats Africa has ever faced is the impact from this new phenomenon of land-grabbing
- AllAfrica
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21 September 2012
The EU's bioeconomy vision is fuelling land grabs in Africa.
THESE days, as we follow the struggle against the Taliban in the northwest, we can be forgiven for missing other important news. For instance, I had filed away a report on plans to lease large chunks of agricultural land in Punjab and Sindh to overseas investors in the back of my mind, planning to write about it later. When I ran a Google search on the subject, however, I realised the enormity of the scam.When I ran a Google search
Water grabbing refers to situations where powerful actors take control of valuable water resources for their own benefit, depriving local communities whose livelihoods often depend on these resources and ecosystems.
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
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24 June 2010
Eight years after releasing its first report on land grabbing, GRAIN publishes a new dataset documenting nearly 500 cases of land grabbing around the world.
The following report, by independent researcher Anna Bolin, explores the global trends and influences at work behind agriculture mega-projects like MIFEE in Papua.
- Down to Earth
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30 November 2011
MCC is playing a key role in commodifying Africa’s farmlands
The growing financialisation of Brazilian agribusiness is enabling foreign investment in the industry most responsible for deforestation - and land grabbing
- Intercept
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23 November 2021
Civil society, including African farmers unions, need to educate local people that such land deals are not in their interests, however couched in 'win-win' terminology they appear to be.
There are countless examples of governments handing it over at bargain prices to foreign investors, ranging from hedge funds to biofuel producers.
Eritrean law blocking foreign investors from owning land and the country's desire for self-reliance makes it highly unlikely that it will fall for the neocolonial phenomenon of land grabbing.
- Geeska Afrika
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29 December 2016
Rural sociologist Saker El Nour discusses the complex power dynamics between main actors within land reclamation projects in Egypt.
- Mada Masr
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02 February 2021
The digitalisation of information on land and natural resources is exacerbating land grabbing in the remaining agricultural frontiers of Latin America.
The farner’s union claims that the Malibya deal was done behind closed doors and then presented as a fait accompli, a deal that effectively hands over control of Mali’s main rice growing region to a foreign power.
On 29th May, farmers in the Polish Region of West Pomerania organised a protest against land grabbing.
It is not clear whether a strategy is in place to ensure that part of the food produced by the rich food importers farms will be sold locally.
- Business Day
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08 June 2009
"The motivation for South African farmers is simple," said Theo de Jager, Agri SA's deputy president, who helped negotiate the deal. "One in four farms must be redistributed in the next four or five years. So for new entrants into the sector and for those farmers who want to expand there is nowhere to go."
- National Post
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21 October 2009
Quietly, these modern-day land marauders are coming to Canada—undermining family farms, compromising local food sovereignty, and harming the environment.
- Dominion
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27 September 2010
The much-discussed Congo land-lease, granting 200,000 hectares to South African farmers with a further 10 million hectares in the balance, appears to mark a departure from the usual terms underpinning foreign acquisition of fertile land by multinationals
- Pambazuka
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07 January 2010