Lao and Chinese businesses this week signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for investment in organic farming in Laos, at a cost of about US$5 million.

Indian author and media commentator Anand Giridharadas joins this Al Jazeera programme along with Oakland Institute’s Executive Director, Anuradha Mittal, and Christine L. Adamow, Managing Director of Africa BioFuel, a US company invested in farmland in Kenya and Tanzania.

NGOs tried to get a pronouncement in the Changwon Declaration against the continued grabbing of land throughout Africa and Asia.

Russia’s VTB Capital plans $1bn agriculture fund which will begin by buying assets in Russia and Kazakhstan – from land to processing companies.

BBC film looks at large-scale industrial farming investments in Zambia.

Three weeks ago, a team of Vietnamese investors and their technical advisers visited Sierra Leone to conduct feasibility studies with the aim of entering the agribusiness sector in the country.

Agriterra revealed plans for further land expansion even after raising its cattle operations to about 16,700 hectares and entering the cocoa market through the acquisition of a Sierra Leone trader.

Venture capitalists, merchant bankers and large conglomerates are all piling in.

Interview with Jan Douwe van der Ploeg, researcher on agriculture investments

In the face of growing economies and rising populations, food security is fast becoming a critical issue for GCC countries. Socio-political problems that arise from food price inflation and some related unrest witnessed in many countries of the Arab world have also created an added sense of urgency.

Elders has begun a sale of all its forestry plantations totalling 50,000ha across the country. Much of the land purchased is expected to be planted with sugar cane, bananas or returned to beef grazing, and COFCO and Wilmar International have indicated their interest.

SLC Agricola has bought its second farm in Brazil's Piaui state in less than two months, expanding into a relatively undeveloped area where land prices are a fraction of those in more popular regions.