Waatea603am | Thursday 22nd September, 2011

King Country trusts join bid for Crafar farms

Two King Country Maori land trusts hope involvement in a Michael Fay-led consortium bidding for the Crafar farms will help them get their ancestral land back.

Chairperson Hardie Peni says two of the 16 Crafar farms are near Tiroa E and Te Hape B's sheep and beef farms on the edge of the Pureora Forest.

He says joining the consortium with other iwi and agribusiness investors was the only way to get a chance to buy the land.

“All the other people that have come on board have identified farms that interest them. Also the other iwi have identified farms within their rohe. What the receiver would not entertain is people coming to them to buy an individual farm. They wanted the whole farming enterprise going to one party,” Mr Peni says.

Receivers KordaMentha say they will consider the $171 million, but not before seeing whether a bigger offer from Shanghai-based Pengxin International Group gets Overseas Investment Office approval.