Cargill

Foreign investment in Australia's food chain is increasing at a rate that is causing concern, and not just for people on the land.

Experts meeting at the World Bank in Washington, DC, discuss how best to assist African smallholder farmers to transition from subsistence to commercial farming.

Land deals, whether as direct purchases or long-term leases, are being brokered in poor countries by advanced capitalist countries and their TNCs

Private equity and fund managers name South America a top place to buy, lease and manage agricultural lands for profit.

Bankers and fund managers are scrambling to build up rural expertise in response to rocketing investor demand to buy entire farms as an inflation hedge.

Cargill's private equity firm says it will set up farms in Asia where "there is a huge lack of competency in farm management practices."

Cargill and Bunge among firms setting up funds to buy farms in Asia and South America.

Plantation company Kulim Bhd is paying US$175 million to buy some 25,000ha of oil palm estates in Papua New Guinea from the world's largest agribusiness company, Cargill Inc, and Singapore government investment arm Temasek Holdings.

Cargill Inc., the world’s largest agribusiness company, has announced the sale of their palm oil plantations in the remote tropical nation of Papua New Guinea (PNG)

Paul Conway, senior vice-president at Cargill, calls food self-sufficiency "a nonsense" and warns that overseas food production through land grabs will likely run into export bans by host countries

While Cargill says it is committed to sustainable and responsible palm oil production across its three plantations in PNG, the firm has been targeted by local and international NGOs, which claim it has polluted rivers and deceived local communities into signing agreements they do not understand.

In June 2009, the Indian company Karuturi took up intensive farming in Ethiopia. The harvest will be exported to Asia and Europe.