Milk NZ, the local unit of Chinese investor Shanghai PengXin Group, is facing new hurdles with its New Zealand investment plans after being knocked back by the government last year over its proposed $88 million purchase of Lochinver farm.
Opposition parties criticized the government for not revealing documents related to the expenditure of $11 million on a farm to breed sheep in Saudi Arabia for the interest of a Saudi businessman who owns a sheep farm in Hawke's Bay, New Zealand.
The 1317 hectare farm was sold in 2014, on the advice of the Overseas Investment Office, to Ceol & Muir, a company established with the help of Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca.
The processes of the Overseas Investment Office are proving to be a barrier to some companies looking to buy New Zealand land.
The Government office which decides whether or not to allow foreigners to buy sensitive New Zealand land will receive a 25 per cent boost in staff and new enforcement powers.
Ministers approved the sale of a New Zealand farm to a Panamanian firm whose treasurer was also a director of a company that Portugal believed laundered money for former Brazilian and Portuguese national soccer coach Luiz Felipe Scolari.
The Overseas Investment Office has re-opened its review of the sale of Taranaki farmland to foreign investors after revelations the Argentinian owners were prosecuted for pollution and discharging toxic chemicals into a river in Buenos Aires.
The Panamanian trust set up by Mossack Fonseca to buy the Onetai station in Taranaki, New Zealand has a Uruguayan connection that may not have brought to the attention of ministers who approved its sale.
The funds will acquire farms and farmland assets, including permanent crops, arable, and pastoral farmland, and lease to experienced operators across the focused geographical regions of Australia and New Zealand.
Pengxin, a little-known Shanghai real estate developer that owns Theland milk powder, will become the world’s largest private landowner if Australia’s authorities clear its most ambitious bid yet.
Foreign buying of land is not going to stop any time soon. It is up to the host country to look after itself.
The Overseas Investment Office has granted consent for Weihai Station to buy 595 hectares of land at 152 Baker Rd, Waikaretu - about 100km southwest of Auckland, New Zealand.
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