Ethiopian government has defended its plan to offer 2.7 million hectares of farmland to foreign companies despite millions of citizens who need food aid from the international community.
The terms of farmland deals are hardly made public. Although a theoretical possibility exists in a few cases for some transfer of technology for agricultural development, risk also exists to peasant farmers who cannot compete with well-resourced commercial farms. Take, for instance, the case of barley and oilseeds producers in Ethiopia.
The consensus is that Africa is being out-gunned. While regulations & rules are debated, the amount of land being bought up by foreign investors is increasing at a rapacious speed.
Yes, we should be concerned about the farmers' rapid loss of land. But aren't we pointing the finger in the wrong direction?
The Thai government has reiterated it will do everything in its power to keep the country's rice farming land out of the hands of foreign investors.
Gulf states buying farmland in developing nations for food security face the risk of damaging their reputation as international investors as the deals are seen as land grabs, a Rothschild executive said yesterday.
A group of 300 Cambodian people affected by land grabs and evictions - and representing thousands more - gathered in Phnom Penh yesterday to tell the government of their concerns, and to call with a single voice on the government and donor nations to act to protect their land.
According to Steve Yuzpe, the CFO of Sprott Resource, ongoing population growth, dwindling arable land, water issues, even the falling yield productivity delivered by genetically modified seeds will be the big drivers for continued record demand—pushing food prices ever higher.
Global Witness, an environmental pressure group, estimates Pheapimex now controls 7% of Cambodia's land area.
Direct investment in farmland has outperformed stock and bond returns over various timescales with substantially lower volatility than the US equity market, according to Stephen Johnston of Calgary-based Agcapita Partners
The Gulf countries remain 'highly vulnerable' to commodity price volatility on international markets, as the recent surge in sugar prices shows.
Hassad Food, owned by Qatar's sovereign wealth fund, will buck the Gulf Arab trend of buying farmland abroad to secure food supplies and consider taking stakes in agricultural companies instead, its chairman said.
