Two Vietnamese firms bankrolled by Deutsche Bank and the International Finance Corporation – the World Bank's private lending arm – are leading a wave of land grabs in Cambodia and Laos, causing widespread evictions, illegal logging and food insecurity, according to a report.
Rubber Barons shows how vast amounts of land have been acquired for rubber plantations in Cambodia and Laos by two of Vietnam's biggest largest companies, Hoang Anh Gia Lai (HAGL) and the Vietnam Rubber Group (VRG).
Everywhere in Africa the story is more or less the same: communal rights are being grossly interfered with, farming systems upturned, livelihoods decimated, and water use and environments changed in ways which are dubiously sustainable.
Liberia's silent land war has now become a war of words and placards with tension brewing daily either between individuals and families or companies and tribes or clans.
The most recent U.N. demographic projections show world population growing to 9.3 billion by 2050, an addition of 2.3 billion people. Most people think these demographic projections, like most of those made over the last half-century, will in fact materialize. But this is unlikely, given the difficulties in expanding the food supply, such as those posed by spreading water shortages and global warming. We are fast outgrowing the earth’s capacity to sustain our increasing numbers.
About 40 ethnic activist groups are calling on the government, ethnic militias and the international community to address a surge in land-grabbing, as companies move into Burma’s ethnic regions following recent ceasefire agreements.
A consortium of Saudi groups - comprising dairy giant Almarai, grain importer Al Rajhi and Salic, the agriculture arm of the country's sovereign wealth fund - agreed to pay US $92mn to acquire Continental Farmers Group located in northern Poland and western Ukraine
Governments in African countries lease out land at low rates, which makes it attractive to investors
Savills, the UK property consultancy, believes sub-Saharan Africa, in agriculture, is the Brazil of the 1970s but warns against investments in farms of over 5,000 ha because of land ownership sensitivities.
Olam is putting together an investment plan for the areas of agricultural production and food distribution, which could equal the amount of investment made since it started operating in Mozambique.
BrasilAgro flagged the buoyancy of Brazil's farmland market by selling off part of its holding for the equivalent of $6,000 an acre – more than four times the price it paid six years ago.
A visit to Mozambique dispels any notion that big business is going to ‘feed Africa’. Hazel Healy reports on a land rush in full swing.
