Egypt

In the past week, the alleged claim by Egypt’s Agriculture minister Amin Abaza that Uganda offered his country over 2 million acres of fertile land to produce wheat to feed the Arab nation’s 81 million people has rattled Ugandans.

President Yoweri Museveni initiated talks with Egyptian officials over the possibility of growing wheat and corn for the north African state in Uganda but no firm offer of land was made, Egypt and State House sources have separately said.

The Uganda government had allocated to Egypt two million acres of land to grow wheat and corn this year, Egypt`s minister of Agriculture revealed. He asserted that the land was in a number of places. Two million acres is equivalent to 2.2% of Uganda`s total area.

The UAE and other Gulf oil producers are considering creating a giant fund to invest in farm in fertile Arab areas and other nations to slash a soaring import bill and ease reliance on foreign markets for their food.

Egypt has agreed to buy a million tonnes of wheat from Kazakhstan to meet local market needs, and Uganda has allocated farmland for the Arab country to grow wheat and corn, Egyptian state-owned media said on Saturday.

L'Etat cède 880000 hectares de terre arable pour 670 millions d'euros. Publiée mi-août par le Financial Times, l'annonce du gouvernement soudanais n'est plus vraiment une nouveauté. Comme d'autres avant lui, le pays est prêt à céder un territoire presque aussi grand que l'Ile-de-France à des investisseurs étrangers trop contents de s'exécuter.

“We are investing in land in Sudan, Pakistan and Egypt to secure food supplies without being at the mercy of market fluctuations,” Dr Rashid Ahmad Bin Fahd, Minister of Environment and Water, said at a conference in Dubai yesterday.

Global food shortages have placed the Middle East and North Africa in a quandary, as they are forced to choose between growing more crops to feed an expanding population or preserving their already scant supply of water.

One issue reportedly delaying UAE investment in Pakistan is the Gulf state appearing to want “blanket exemption” from Islamabad’s agricultural export policies.

The United Arab Emirates is seeking to invest in agricultural projects in Kazakhstan as part of its efforts to secure food supplies.

The UAE is actively looking at acquiring farmland in Vietnam, Cambodia, Africa and South America in an effort to ensure the availability of food stocks, according to the UAE Minister of Economy.

Globalisation has taken yet another twist with some Middle Eastern countries deciding to grow their crops in other countries.