Indonesia will allocate at least 2 million hectares of farm land to joint ventures with Saudi investors to be used mainly for the cultivation of rice, a Saudi newspaper reported on Saturday.
Refuged under a shelter as a downpour drenched the village square of Ambalavy in northwest Madagascar, André Rabenampiana says he knows the wood "varona" but has never heard of the Indian company Varun International.
A move by Madagascar's army-backed leader to nix a huge South Korean farming deal has exposed the risks of such ventures in Africa, where land remains an emotive issue prone to populist or nationalist opposition.
Deposed President Marc Ravalomanana brought the house of Madagascar down upon himself. But he has been replaced by a young untested leader who, although he has some public support, is full of himself and clearly contemptuous of democratic institutions. The result is that investment in Madagascar, and perhaps across the continent, will be hurt, writes Stephen Hayes
Growing interest from Asia and Middle East countries to lease agricultural land in Africa "is not a bad thing" but must be handled properly and in a transparent way, a top World Bank official said on Thursday.
Are there any answers to this looming crisis? Some countries are buying land. There is vague talk about governments introducing “water management reforms”. Even more opaquely, there are calls for “multi-country discussions on trans-boundary issues, international trade and investment flows”.
A conference for fund managers tied to agriculture held annually in Sydney by Austock, an Australian broker, attracted a few dozen contrarian souls three years ago. This year’s event, which began on March 16th, had to be restricted to several hundred ticket-holders, with many others turned away.
South Korea’s project to transform Madagascar into its breadbasket, branded by some as neo-colonial, came to an abrupt end on Wednesday when the Indian Ocean island’s new president said he would shelve the plan.
A deal for South Korea's Daewoo Logistics to lease over 1 million hectares of Madagascar to grow food crops is off, the island's new leader said on Wednesday.
Daewoo Logistics, the South Korean company, said on Wednesday that it was confident that Madagascar’s new government would support a plan to lease a huge tract of farmland on the island to grow food crops to send back to Seoul.
The Kenyan government is considering leasing a large tract of land in the Tana River Delta in eastern Kenya to Qatar's government. In return, Qatar would build a port in the seaside town of Lamu.
The truth is that if exploitation of a developing country’s natural resources by the West is colonialism, so it is when rich countries of the South do the same.
