Australians do realise the value of what is being sold, a land agent and rural property specialist said, "but their hands are tied because they can't raise the money".

Pambazuka News spoke to Anuradha Mittal, Jeff Furman and Frederic Mousseau about what prompted their research on large-scale investments in land in Africa and what they discovered.

African farmers do need investment and support. They desperately need decent roads and access to local markets, processing equipment to add value to their own diverse farm produce, storage and drying facilities to prevent post-harvest losses, and basic amenities such as schools and health centres and water wells to improve rural lives, so that farming communities can thrive. But foreign investors are not in business to provide any of these things.

UK-based SilverStreet Capital has received about $198 million in commitments to its Africa-focused fund from the Danish pension fund Pensionskassernes Administration (PKA) and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC).

Les fonds de pension sont peut-être l’une des rares catégories d’accapareurs de terres auxquelles les gens peuvent couper l’herbe sous le pied, pour la bonne et simple raison que c’est de leur argent qu’il s’agit.

Los fondos de pensiones pueden ser uno de los pocos tipos de acaparadores de tierras que los trabajadores pueden desbaratar, por el sólo hecho que ellos son los dueños del dinero

Japanese translation of article of GRAIN, "Pension funds: key players in the global farmland grab"

As controversy continues to bubble in Australia over the latest big local farmland buy-up and what it means for food production, it’s worth looking to see where these foreign raiders are coming from, who’s backing them and how other countries are tightening their regulations to stop them.

Pension funds may be one of the few classes of land grabbers that people can pull the plug on, by sheer virtue of the fact that it is their money.

Some pension funds are beginning to question their investments in commodities after accusations that massive flows into the sector have distorted markets, fuelled food inflation and hurt poor nations.

Denmark's PKA has invested DKK250m (€33.5m) in African agriculture via the Silverland private equity fund (a SilvertStreet Capital fund)

The global financial crisis may have hit tax-effective agribusiness schemes hard, but the prospects of the small group of companies that survived are anything but gloomy. "We're actually tapping into the new GFC, which is the global food crisis," says Wayne Overall, executive director of agribusiness managed investment scheme operator Almond Investors Limited

The Swedish National Pension Fund is teaming up with US institutional investor TIAA-CREF to buy farmland in Australia.

Protestors have been demonstrating in Geneva against the growth in investments in agriculture that they say endangers food security in many developing countries.

The Second Swedish National Pension Fund (AP2) will invest $250 million in a joint venture with a US pension fund and financial services provider to buy farmland in the United States, Brazil and Australia.

Foreign speculators are increasing price volatility and supply insecurity in the global food system, according to a series of investigative reports released today by the Oakland Institute.

Investors are thinking big when it comes to farmland purchases, reports Andrew Shirley in Knight Frank's Wealth Report 2011

That land is far more complex and valuable than plain dirt was one of the central themes of FC Business Intelligence’s “World Agriculture Investment USA” conference in Chicago on May 9-10, 2011. A report from AllAboutAlpha.

Swedish pension buffer fund AP2 and US pension fund manager TIAA-CREF have formed a joint venture to invest at least US$500 million in farmland in the US, Australia and Brazil.

The world’s second-oldest profession–farming–is a hot investment

So many Wall Street-types crammed the Waldorf Astoria in New York City last week for a global farmland and agribusiness conference that hosts warned the crowd of 600 not to block the fire exits.

Pensionskassernes Administration, a Denmark-based fund that manages about $25 billion, plans to invest $370 million in farmland globally, said Jens Henrik Staugaard Johansen, a portfolio manager.

Rural MPs, especially those from NSW and Queensland, have been fielding increasing complaints from constituents in recent months about the level of foreign ownership of Australian farms and agricultural businesses.

Black River's investment pipeline includes a Chinese pork producer and distributor, a duck farming firm in northern China, a fish producer in Costa Rica and a frozen fish processor in Singapore.

Investors are buying Canadian agricultural land, betting that rising food prices, a ballooning global population and growing worldwide scarcities in farmland will mean a payoff for them.

As a relatively new and untapped asset class, farmland remains mysterious to some insitutional investors. Greg Bright spoke to Charmion McBride, chief operating officer, global farmland, at Insight Investment in the UK.

"All of a sudden the world is waking up and saying, 'Wow, emerging markets, food security... this asset class is going to really perform in the medium term -- the next 8-20 years,'" says new convert James Howard, manager of the Futuregrowth Agri-Fund

Alberta pension fund pays $415 million for more than 1500 square miles of forest in Australia to be converted to timber plantations and agriculture.

Brookfield will invest in Brazilian properties primarily comprised of pasture land that may be converted to higher-and-better uses, including soybean, corn and sugarcane production

Finding suitable farmland investment vehicles is not as easy as one might think.