UAE

Most of the produce from the proposed project, mainly vegetables and fruits, would be exported to the Gulf. Questions have been raised on why the Government has chosen to lease the land instead of engaging local farmers to boost food security in the country.

Vision 3, an alliance formed by Gulf Finance House, Ithmaar Bank and Abu Dhabi Investment House, announced the make up of its board at its inaugural meeting yesterday.

Egypt will receive a number of UAE delegations next month to discuss proposals involving agriculture, land reclamation and the food industry in southern Egypt, as well as infrastructure and renewable energy projects.

Such blockbuster deals neglect to take into consideration the true interests of the farmers

The government aims to net more investment from Middle East oil state main players next year, in particular in the agricultural sector, despite the global economic downturn, says a government official.

Agriculture Department denies a recent WA trade delegation visit to several Middle Eastern countries was to promote selling WA agricultural land for grain and livestock.

Agriculture Minister Terry Redman says Western Australia should embrace moves by Arab interests in the Middle East to buy prime Wheatbelt farmland to secure their future food supplies. Two groups from the Middle East are due to visit the State early next year as they consider investments of up to $1 billion in cropping, sheep and dairy production in WA.

"They're not talking about $2 or $3 million, they're talking about $20 million to up to $1 billion of investment in big projects," Peter Metcalfe, the director of grain industry development for Western Australia, said in an interview.

Middle Eastern countries flush with oil funds want to invest up to $1bn in Australian farmland as they extend a drive for food security to the world’s second-largest wheat exporter, a grains official said yesterday.

Rich governments and corporations are triggering alarm for the poor as they buy up the rights to millions of hectares of agricultural land in developing countries in an effort to secure their own long-term food supplies.

Gulf nations now are quietly scouring the globe for rich farmland to rent or buy outright.

This analysis looks at how the oil-rich Muslim economies could leverage their existing relationships with agriculture based Muslim economies (which have a wide productivity gap with the worlds net agriculture exporters) taking them to globally competitive levels; reaping for themselves high investment returns, securing their own food sources, and contributing to alleviation of the food crisis from other Muslim countries.