Agriculture Outlook 2010: Farmland investor conference in London, UK

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Agriculture Outlook 2010

23-25 June, 2010

London, UK

Global Outlook Day - Wednesday 23 June 2010


8.20am

Registration and breakfast

8.50am

CHAIRMAN’S OPENING REMARKS

Division Head, Agri-food Trade & Markets, OECD

GLOBAL MACRO TRENDS

9am

OPENING KEYNOTE ADDRESS: The future of agriculture - “supply crisis” or “green revolution”?

  • The historical context: where are we now?
  • What are the biggest supply threats of the next 5 years, and how significant are they?
  • Where are the opportunities?
  • What are the critical success factors for an efficient and sustainable agriculture sector?

Managing Director, Global Government and Corporate Affairs, Bunge

9.40am

GUEST ADDRESS: Challenges and opportunities for the future CAP

Commissioner for Agriculture & Rural Development, European Commission

10.20am

KEYNOTE PANEL DISCUSSION: Food security - was the 2008 price spike a one-off market blip or a sign of things to come?

  • Is food security a real challenge, or just a buzzword?
  • To what extent is food security primarily a political issue?
  • What caused the 2008 food crisis, and was there an overreaction?
  • Where are food prices heading in the short-, medium- and long-term?

Managing Director, Global Government and Corporate Affairs, Bunge

Director, Agriculture Division, WTO Secretariat, World Trade Organization

Commissioner for Agriculture & Rural Development, European Commission

Director, Trade and Markets Division, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)

Economic Research Service, USDA

11am

Morning refreshments and networking

11.30am

Business models in agriculture: will vertical integration deliver?

  • A review of traditional business models in agriculture
  • Which types of farmers are starting to forward integrate, and how?
  • Which agri-businesses are starting to backward integrate?
  • Is there any evidence yet that vertical integration makes economic sense?
  • Is vertical integration a way of managing risk in the supply chain?
  • Which business models are most likely to succeed?

Head of Agriculture & Agrifood, Credit Agricole

12.10pm

Why Direct Farmland Investment will outperform Commodity Futures and Agriculture Equities

  • A review of historical risk return profiles
  • What are the implications of increased capital flow into commodity futures?
  • Do commodity futures and farmland provide a hedge against inflation?
  • What is the investible farmland universe?
  • How and where to achieve enhanced returns in farmland investing

Managing Partner and CEO, Brookfield Brazil Agri (Group)

12.40pm

Risk and Reward in Global Farmland Investing

  • An overview of global farmland investment areas
  • Major risk categories
  • Leasing v. operating - which is safer?
  • Finding a balance between risk and reward - the EU-CEE region

CEO/CIO, Agrotrust

12.50pm

Networking Lunch

sponsored by:

QUANTIFYING THE DEMAND OPPORTUNITY

2pm

Quantifying the future rise in global food demand: how big is the opportunity?

  • What impact has the global recession had on food demand?
  • Key factors influencing demand over the next 10 years
  • How significant will China’s role be?
  • Forecasting future demand and its sources over the next 5, 10 and 25 year periods

Division Head, Agri-food Trade & Markets, OECD

MANAGING THE SUPPLY THREATS

2.35pm

Water quality and scarcity: are there cost-effective solutions?

  • Why are changes in water supply affecting agriculture in different world regions?
  • Assessing the economics of desalination: why isn’t it working?
  • The potential impact of this challenge on world agriculture

Chief Executive Officer, Seawater Greenhouse

3.10pm

How will weather changes affect production patterns over the next 5 years, and what are the solutions?

  • How much better are we getting at predicting weather patterns over short-term time periods like 5 years?
  • How can agriculture prepare for greater weather volatility?
  • Should weather predictions really influence investor strategy?

Managing Director, AGRO, Munich Re

3.45pm

Speed Networking

4.45pm

HEAD-TO-HEAD DEBATE: Competing crops: to what extent do biofuels constrain global food supply?

  • What evidence is there so far that biofuels have increased the price of food?
  • How big of an impact on food production can biofuels have in the long-term?

Chief Operating Officer, CropEnergies

Head of Section, Agricultural & Food Policy, Agriculture Economics Research Institute

5.20pm

How big will the impact of soil degradation on a global scale be on agriculture?

  • Examining the data: how serious is the problem?
  • Where do the biggest threats come from: erosion, loss of nutrients, salinisation, contamination or desertification?
  • Exploring solutions to each if these threats
  • Is it feasible to develop farming systems that increase productivity without soil degradation?
  • Exploring and assessing new approaches to managing land

Food & Farming Director, Soil Association

5.55pm

Moving forward: innovative solutions to quantify and manage the risk of disease, climate change and other threats

  • Examining the impacts of pests and diseases on yields of food and cash crops
  • How might climate change and increased trade affect the incidence and spread of these threats?
  • What is needed relative to what is currently available with shortcomings in plant health information: dispersed, doubtful and uncoordinated data
  • Developing real-time global plant health surveillance system
  • Building a global plant health centre: the function and role of an integrated plant health information system

Chief Executive Officer, CABI

6.30pm

End of day one

-

Farmland Opportunities Day - Thursday 24 June 2010

8.20am

Breakfast and networking

8.50am

CHAIRMAN’S OPENING REMARKS

INVESTING IN FARMLAND

9am

GUEST ADDRESS: Africa - a future bread basket for the world?

These are critical times. The dwindling of the Earth’s energy, water and food resources, within the context of global warming and geopolitical instability, poses a threat to humanity on a scale that might once have been unimaginable. Yet, we have been here before.

David Murrin has twenty-three years' experience analysing financial markets, but began formulating his theories on collective emotional behavioural patterns in Papua New Guinea. This experience, together with years of research into military history, has been instrumental in helping him to construct a macro view of geopolitics in the coming decades and the critical role Africa will play in deciding the future of civilisation and new empires.

Chief Investment Officer, Emergent Asset Management

9.40am

END INVESTOR PANEL: What farmland opportunities are investors looking for, and why?

  • What expectations do investors have from farmland?
  • Why did they pick the specific investments they made?
  • Do they prefer a pure farmland investment or one combined with a particular farming activity?
  • What world regions are they currently interested in?

Senior Portfolio Manager, Commodities, APG

Head of Pension Fund, Merseyside Pension Fund

Director, Global Private Markets, TIAA-CREF

Chairman of Trustees, BMS Group

10.20am

What farmland acquisition risks do you need to look out for, and how can you manage them?

  • What are the trends and drivers behind recent farmland acquisition?
  • What are the risks involved in acquiring farmland?
  • How can you structure agricultural investments to manage these risks?

Senior Researcher, Sustainable Development, International Institute for Environment and Development

10.50am

Improving your acquisition due diligence: what pitfalls should you avoid?

11.20am

Morning refreshments and networking

11.50am

Combining farmland and farming to maximise returns: critical success factors

Founder and CEO, Jantzen Development A/S

REGION BY REGION FARMLAND ANALYSIS

12.20pm

What are the opportunities and risks of investing in these farmland regions?

This unique session for the rest of the day will deliver case studies from crop growers across the world, each focusing on a specific region and all of them answering the following questions:

  • What was the original rationale behind investing in the land?
  • How has the investment performed?
  • How easy is it to navigate the regulatory framework in the region?
  • Are there significant infrastructure challenges to investing in the region’s farmland?
  • What is the geo-political risk of the region?
  • To what extent does the case study example represent the region as a whole?
  • Conclusion: what are the pros and cons of investing in the region?

12.20pm

Germany & Lithuania: Is a further rise in farmland prices unavoidable?

Chief Executive Officer, KTG Agrar

12.45pm

Poland, Romania & Czech Republic: Opportunities for scale in agriculture

Chief Executive Officer, Spearhead International

1.10pm

Ukraine: How will biofuel developments change the structure and role of agriculture?

Chief Executive Officer, Landkom International

1.35pm

Networking lunch

2.45pm

Argentina: The most efficient agriculture industry in the world?

President, Adecoagro

3.10pm

Brazil: Agricultural development in Tocantins

Manager, Special Opportunities, Bunge

3.35pm

Bolivia & Uruguay: Overview and experiences in agriculture

Chief Executive Officer, El Tejar

4pm

Afternoon refreshments and networking

4.30pm

South Africa: Ownership of land in a politically volatile environment

Director of Operations, Senwes

4.55pm

Indonesia: Sustainable growth through socially responsible practices

Deputy Chief Operating Officer, Kencana Agri Limited

5.20pm

Drinks reception & networking

-

Maximising Returns Through Farming Innovation Day - Friday 25 June 2010


8.20am

Breakfast and networking

8.50am

CHAIRMAN’S OPENING REMARKS

Partner, Conservation Finance International

9am

GUEST ADDRESS: How to attract permanent strategic funding in the Middle East: navigating the historical, cultural and political waters

Karim Shariff founded Majlis Investment Management with college classmate and friend Robert Bush Jr, and has spent many years managing the wealth of some of the biggest families in the Gulf. A truly inspirational speaker who will give you a unique insider’s insight into the mindset and motivations of the Middle Eastern investor, Karim also has the distinction

of having been held captive at gunpoint for 44 hours at the Oberoi in Mumbai in November 2008. As part of his Guest Address, Karim will discuss:

  • Assessing the geopolitics of the region now and historically
  • Surveying the new financial centers in the region and the new power politique
  • Defining what is strategically relevant and the emerging sectoral themes by geography

Founding Partner, Majlis Investment Management

9.40am

END INVESTOR PANEL: What motivates the agri-business investor, and what return profile are they looking for?

  • What expectations do investors have from their agri portfolio?
  • Why did they pick the specific investments they made?
  • What return potential are they looking for?
  • What do they see as their main expansion areas in agriculture moving forward?

Head of Real Assets & Insurance, PGGM Investments

Member of Investment Committee, Flora Family Foundation / Connexion Capital

Director of the Rural Estate, The Crown Estate

Managing Director, Saumweber Holdings

10.20am

Morning refreshments and networking

FARMING INNOVATION FOR GREATER ROI: NEW TRENDS

10.50am

Examining the business case for GM crops: how clear-cut are the benefits?

  • Quantifying the increase in yields: how much of a difference does GM really make?
  • Are input costs genuinely lowered, or are fertilizer costs simply replaced by higher seed costs?
  • What evidence is there that GM allows expansion into land that is not productive through traditional farming?

School of Biological Sciences, University of Reading

11.20am

Organic farming: can small-scale operations generate largescale returns?

  • Assessing the yield per hectare and cost per hectare: is it an economically viable model?
  • Can real scale ever be achieved?
  • Is the business model dependent on premium pricing, and can it compete with non-organic pricing?
  • Does the small-scale nature of these businesses prevent them from being suitable for institutional investors?

Farms Director, Daylesford Organic

11.50am

How can the latest innovation in crop inputs drive the growth of your agri-business?

CEO, Plant Impact plc

12.20pm

Networking lunch

FARMING INNOVATION FOR GREATER ROI: CROP BY CROP CASE STUDIES

1.30pm

How is innovation being used across crop types to drive up yields and reduce input costs whilst managing soil degradation?

This unique session will deliver innovation-led case studies from crop growers across the world, each focusing on specific crop types and all of them answering the following questions:

  • How was the opportunity to improve yields identified?
  • What level of investment was required, and how easy or difficult was it to find the funding?
  • What were the major obstacles to the success of the project, and how were they overcome?
  • What role did new technologies play?
  • Analysis of the results so far: to what extent have yields been improved and input costs reduced?
  • How has soil degradation been managed?

1.30pm

Potatoes & Cereals

Chief Executive Officer, Mriya Agro

1.50pm

Corn & Rice

Former CEO of HLH and Executive Director of CropLife Asia, CropLife Asia

2.10pm

Olives

Managing Director, Frankland River Olive Co

2.30pm

Palm Oil

Chief Executive Officer, New Britain Palm Oil

2.50pm

Afternoon refreshments and networking

COMMODITIES OUTLOOK

3.15pm

What are the drivers behind each of these commodities, and what is the short-, mid- and long-term price forecast?

This new session for 2010 will provide a snapshot forecast of prices for a number of key commodities. Each speaker will address the following questions:

  • What are the latest demand and supply trends in this commodity class?
  • What are the basic, fundamental drivers of this commodity?
  • What opportunities and threats can we expect in the next 12 months, and further into the future?
  • What is the short-, mid- and long-term price forecast for this commodity?

3.15pm

Soybeans

Vice President, Commodities Research, Barclays Capital

3.35pm

Sugar

Commodity Strategist, Macquarie

3.55pm

Grains

Managing Editor & Chief Analyst, Strategie Grains

4.15pm

Cocoa

Analyst, Commodities Research, Barclays Capital

4.35pm

Close of conference

  • Sign the petition to stop Industria Chiquibul's violence against communities in Guatemala!
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