Is it the re-colonisation of Africa? Why are some of the rich guys worldwide eager to buy a tasty piece of the African cake? And surely why are these African countries, some of them having fought bitter terrifying bloody wars for their sovereignty, so busy selling their land cheaply to the highest bidders? The poor peasants are being screwed once again. This time it is not the white man just deciding and telling them to move off their ancestral lands. It is our own fellow black sons and daughters and our own governments! Yes, the men we voted into power are busy selling rich African land to foreigners, multinational corporate, and grabbing it for themselves. Look at the staggering amount of land one Dr Philip Chiyangwa owns that has been availed for his divorce proceedings! Meanwhile, the poor man continues to live in wretched off conditions, and is shown the emerging thieving black middle classes as what to expect if he works hard. The truth is that a majority of our leaders are corrupt, ruthless and greedy, and have no interest in the welfare of their own people. The largest number of foreigners buying African land comes mainly from none other than the very colonial and imperial powers Africans were fighting against. In the background of this, prolific land grabbing across the African continent by the international community in the hundreds of thousands of hectares, described as ‘the new scramble’ is affecting the average Africans’ endeavours to end starvation and unemployment. The land being sold is now used for crops and bio-fuels, benefiting overseas markets to the disadvantage of Africa. Let us all bear in mind that our land is not a commodity, but a fixed asset that has an emotional attachment in most African cultures. Thus most absentee landlords accumulating chunks of African land as investments do it simply to selfishly enrich themselves. To succeed, local politicians are corruptly or naively lured into such deals, hence it is no surprise that most African governments are in a frenzy to sell the land without considering the impact to their own people. Oxfam confirms that this trend is threatening African food security
Zimbabwe, who is benefiting?
In Africa, I am sure the most famous phrase regarding land is from none other our controversial Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe; ‘Zimbabwe will never be a colony again.’ So iconic, yet so ironic! The President has let the reclaimed land mainly go his party’s leaders, their families and friends. Despite the famed land repossession, and after one of the world’s bitter colonial wars in which thousands died to reclaim land, many black Zimbabweans do not own any land at all. The truth is that our leaders sold their principles and souls, if they ever had any. Zimbabwe’s land issue is so well and documented. It is both a joy and a pain to dwell on it. Zimbabwe’s land invasions brought joy to some and misery to others. It was all misery to commercial farmers and their employees, individual black land owners of other political persuasions, and of course agricultural companies that relied on farming, financial houses that depended on commercial farming. Not only that, those who invaded and resettled themselves in some land soon found themselves chased off by political elites. Uncertainty prevailed unabated as politicians also counterclaimed each other’s land. Up to now I wonder if the so-called Offer Letters that re-allocate farms that can still be terminated by the Minister of Lands, are worth celebrating about. The letters heralding the 99-year leases ‘grant virtually all the powers and rights to the State, but few to the settler,’ thus this land remains state land and this is illustrated by how more than 100,000 new A1 farmers were resettled without any documentation at all. This is subjecting them to insecurity as state officials can move them should the land be required for other uses. Of late, the government has been taking land off the resettled farmers deemed not using it effectively. The main consolation is that now a reasonable number of Zimbabweans, unlike in most other African countries, are utilising land for agricultural purposes. Looking at Africa in general; we see a sorrowful betrayal of our hunger for economic and political independence.
Betrayal; some of the sickening land deals in African
In that beautiful island of Madasgascar, a former government had made deal with Korea’s Daiwoo Logistics to plant corn on about half of Madagascar’s arable land, that is, on a territory half the size of Belgium. The protests following the deal led to the downfall of the government in 2008. This deal was rank madness if you may ask me!! Citizens were chased away to clear land for some foreign owned company whose activities were not even going to benefit them in any way. The lease was eventually revoked, people’s power worked. “Madagascar’s land is neither for sale nor for rent,” said the new president. In any case, its not like the then previous government did not know that the Malagasy people, like everyone else, are deeply tied to their land and that the deal surely did not serve their interests. The aim of the land grabbing South Korean industrial giant was not to increase food production for the Malagasy people. Far from it! The company wanted to produce corn and palm oil on 1.3m hectares (3.2m acres), in one of the biggest deals involving foreign firms seeking to secure African farmland since the world woke up to massive food prices soaring unabated. Get this, ‘Daewoo’s long-term aim was to replace more than half the corn that South Korea, the world’s third-largest corn buyer, imports, mainly from the US and South America.’ So some African island leader thought it was best to serve South Korea’s needs by disadvantaging his own people?
Oh how so correct is this lady; deserving a hug from the likes of Chris Hani, Samora Machel, Capt Thomas Sankara, Josiah Togogara, Joshua Nkomo and many other who perished before seeing this sense of betrayal! From the most populous African country, the land of perennial conflicts, Nigeria; emerged this honourable madam MP, Nkoyo Toyo who is reported as having stated that the large scale purchases of African land amount to an attack on the dignity of African states still struggling with the legacy of colonialism. The honourable lady claims that at least 33 million square hectares of African land have been acquired by foreign interests in just less than 10 years!! Staggering! Africa is in for grabs again. The reason now is the rising energy and food prices that are spurring this global scramble for Africa’s land and water resources as developed countries in their eagerness and desperation to feed their swelling populations, are aggressively buying up prime farmland in Africa at rock bottom prices. The UK Guardian reports that African land ‘eight times the size of the UK has already been bought up by hungry investors.’
A UK Telegraph online news reader, Rick, commented that, ‘Whole sections of Kenyan land have fences, and the local water supply is routed to flower beds. These flowers arrive by aircraft, eventually; at Sainsburys for £4 a bunch ….and swathes more are given one solitary glance, at a funeral, before being put straight on the compost. Local Kenyan people remain behind the fences, of course, in their dry hovels, eating corn starch’ Sad isn’t it? There is no thought or feeling for the poor, hungry and landless African people who made way for these flowers!
Placide Mukebo of the Archdiocese of Lubumbashi presented data to some church leaders and activists ‘showing the extent of private concessions in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Here, 48% of the national territory is under mining concessions, 11% under forestry concessions, and a further 10% are protected areas – meaning that corporate and state interests account for at least 69% of the country’s surface. In Katanga Province, 72% of the land area has been allocated to private companies in the form of mining concessions and, because there is a legal hierarchy in the country’s legal code, the mining law allocating such rights trumps the land law that deals with customary land rights. Contestations over such resources underpin in part the widespread conflict still plaguing that country -See more at: http://www.plaas.org.za/blog/land-belongs-god-stories-southern-frica#sthash.bh1kp2Na.dpuf.
You see, the weak laws in effect say all this so called state land can simply be parcelled out, even cheaply, to some mining entity whose products and profits are simply flown off Africa to the natural resources-starved consumer European populations. These are the very western people who scream ‘go back home’ at African immigrants in their shores!!
The UK Telegraph reported that ‘Liberia, a war torn and impoverished West African country, has sold off more than three tenths of its entire land mass in the last five years.’ Are its citizens now better off with the money paid for the land? They are worse off, crowded and homeless.
Next door in Zambia, one mine in Solwezi had acquired 50,000 square km of African land!! That is 5 million hectares or 12 355 269 acres. And how much is Zambia benefitting from this? It never learns even after the exploitation of its copper by a Swiss mining giant Glencore which rakes in profits by exploiting it. The company does not pay customs duties whilst also falsifying its internal billing and shifting losses, ‘despite Zambia’s low taxes used to attract investors.’
In Mozambique, in typical slave trade era’s American sugar plantation cruelty, the sugar-cane super slim Illovo workers are expected to sweat for peanuts. “The workers do not eat sugar cane; they need food to enable them to work on the sugar cane fields.” This illustrates their anger at that foreign owned sugar estate, where the community members indicated that Illovo’s investments in sugar cane, has deprived them, not only of their valued lands, ‘but their livelihoods and subsistence food production were severely undermined because of Illovo’s practices to ‘persuade’ peasants to turn their land into sugar-cane production.’ How dare these colonial imperialists cheat and coerce peasants to turn over their land and subsequently watch them starve? How so cruel, and where is the people’s government of FRELIMO when the ‘community alleged that the company dammed and denied irrigation water to community members who refused to participate in sugar cane production, poisoned the soil and peasants food crops by aerial spraying of pesticides, and closed access roads?’ Now up to 7m hectares of land are potentially available for investors, with western hedge funds reported to be ‘working with South Africans businesses to buy vast tracts of forest and farmland for investors in Europe and the US. The contracts show the government will waive taxes for up to 25 years, but few jobs will be created.’ Cry the beloved continent and its bastardised people. Is it now time for another revolution to claim our land from our elites and foreign investors? See more at: ttp://www.plaas.org.za/blog/mozambique-land-grabs-expose-hypocrisy-large-scale-land-transfers-private-investors#sthash.KollzIsd.dpuf.
The UK Telegraph reports that researchers found that in the three year period between 2007 and 2009 only 7% of Mozambique’s foreign owned agricultural land was planted with food crops, yet at that time more than a third of families were starving.
Its gets worse and depressing as one reads more and more about land grab; Aljezeera and the UK Guardian indicated that the colonial and imperial powerhouse, Britain’s ‘firms have acquired more land in Africa for controversial bio-fuel plantations than companies from any other country. Half of the 3.2m hectares of biofuel land identified – in countries from Mozambique to Senegal – is linked to 11 British companies, more than any other country.’
Ever depressing, in yet another poor African country, Tanzania, whose population entirely depends on its lands, ‘the memorandum of understanding between the local government and US-based farm development corporation AgriSol Energy, which is working with Iowa University, stipulates that the two main locations – Katumba and Mishamo – for their project are refugee settlements holding as many as 162,000 people that will have to be closed before the $700m project can start. The refugees have been farming this land for 40 years.’ That is how a soulless and insensitive cruel African government treats other Africans! Would these companies do this in their western parent homes?
And now, in that perennial land of droughts and starvation, according to the UK Guardian, in 2011 the Ethiopian government was reported to be forcibly relocating tens of thousands of villagers from traditional lands to new centres. This is the country research shows is creating millionaires at a faster rate than any other African country. Controversially, according to one Jeffrey commenting in ‘Voices of Africa,’ Ethiopia, ‘is the country which has a Revolution that formed a federation that the land shall belong to the people, but since the government took over the land, it has prioritised external investment over day to day agricultural practices by ordinary members of the community hence, they have millionaires but the country is still stuck by famine, because only the few elites n the government illegally lease the and for their self benefits. I do not see the government controlling the external investors for a long time, very soon they will form alliances which will then take over from the government.’ In this drought prone land, Rights groups like the Oakland Institute claim Indian companies have acquired 6,28,000 hectares of agricultural land under a government programme to lease 3.6 million hectares for export-oriented agriculture. The land the villagers are forced to leave behind has fallen to big state deals concluded with multinational corporate. The Ethiopians took no pleasure; they retaliated by burning down structures of the company. The company stopped developments; so you see? There is power in the people! I don’t advocate violence, but I see it becoming a frequent visitor to these land grabbing investors if they are not sensitive to locals’ needs.
The land grabbing can be comical if not heartbreaking, courtesy of African greedy politicians and naïve civil societies! It is reported that, even the sparkling new state of Africa has seen some of its sons selling South Sudan’s land to some American land grabbers. The Guardian indicated that the largest land deal in South Sudan, about 9% of the land ‘‘bought in the last few years, was negotiated between a Texas-based firm, Nile Trading and Development and a local co-operative run by absent chiefs. The 49-year lease of 400,000 hectares of central Equatoria for around $25,000 (£15,000) allows the company to exploit all natural resources including oil and timber. The company, headed by former US Ambassador Howard Eugene Douglas, says it intends to apply for UN-backed carbon credits that could provide it with millions of pounds a year in revenues.’ Oh my God, for a mere £15 000 in exchange of all that land? My guess is that the £15 000 is made almost every ticking minute as profit!! I need a break, or else I may have a heart attack, this is frightening!! The ambassador needs arresting and his bastards of absent landlords who I am sure have not yet been to this new African state!! I bought a mere one acre residential stand for exactly the same amount in Zimbabwe’s Bulawayo, and yet some people have the audacity to give away for the same price 400 000 hectares rich with natural resources?
I take solace from the men of God when things are this bad in my continent. According to The Institute for Land, Poverty and Agrarian Studies; some good hell raising Church leaders met in Durban at a summit entitled ‘Land Rights and Land Grabbing in Southern Africa’ and these empathetic and sympathetic men of God forthrightly condemned what is happening in Africa. According to them, not that we don’t know any of this; African elites, [including some of the church pretenders anyway] have joined the numerous bastards partaking in land grabbing in Africa. This has left African peasant farmers and other landless and homeless people struggling as this land grabbing is ‘depriving many families of their access to land and other resources such as water, grazing land and firewood.’ http://www.plaas.org.za/blog/land-belongs-god-stories-southern-africa#sthash.bh1kp2Na.dpuf
These no nonsense men of the cloth can be a thorn in the political flesh of our insensitive governments. Together with some activists, who I hope have not yet been bribed to serve the wishes of the land grabbing elites, the god-fearing men from six SADC countries (Zimbabwe, Zambia, Botswana, DRC, South Africa and Angola) met in Durban from 16 to 18 October 2013 and pointed out that African elites and their governments were the main ruthless bastards in this land-grabbing business. The church leaders indicated that most African countries have weak land laws which allow the elites and rich foreign corporate in whose boards they sit to ruthlessly dispossess and ‘displace the poor to pave way for mining, game reserves, golf estates and agricultural activities in pursuit of their own profits.’ We have seen this through how Harare City Council parcelled out land to Philip Chiyangwa. Why doesn’t God bless this continent with good and honest civil servants? Instead, he lets us stay cursed with so much land and minerals, poverty and wars, wealthy foreigners and miseries! The rich have no conscience at all; ‘…a report by the World Bank suggests that purchases in developing countries rose to 45m hectares in 2009, a ten-fold jump from levels of the last decade. Two thirds have been in Africa, where institutions offer weak defence. Two thirds of the land acquired by rich nation investors over the last decade is in Africa, the continent with the greatest food needs. The total acreage transferred to sovereign wealth funds, multinational food producers and even, hedge funds could provide food for one billion.’
Other countries that have been affected
Well, Africans, take heart that its not only happening in our continet, but I wonder if anyone anywhere in the world would part with 400,000 hectares of central Equatoria for around $25,000 (£15,000); allowing a foreign company to exploit all natural resources including oil and timber? Even more than 100 years ago it was as clear as day and night to our ancestors that it was robbery. In Zimbabwe, some hundred years ago King Lobengula had to fight for being cheated to give away our land and natural resources.
Papua New Guinea’s Prime Minister was criticised by California-based Oakland Institute for his failure to act on the findings of his Commission of Inquiry into controversial land leases. Spending meagre resources, the three Commissioners took more than a year to investigate the leasing of more than five million hectares of land, often to foreign interests, without the permission of landowners. Don’t say I am lying, some African politicians are simple corrupt bastards who have no interest in their people, let alone the job they are meant to be doing. This is what the Oakland Institute, Policy Director Frederic Mousseau had to say after producing eight reports on land grabs in Africa before turning his attention to Papua New Guinea. In his own words, ‘It is really shocking to see at the moment what is happening in Papua New Guinea. I have co-ordinated all the studies of land acquisition in Africa and I am afraid I have seen in Papua New Guinea some of the most shocking examples of land grabbing and extraction of resources for foreign interests in a developing country.’ And this is what happened; Claire Kourous, from the PNG NGO Act Now explains what went wrong, ‘The processes that were supposed to have been followed obviously weren’t followed so we had major forestry and logging companies just come in and take advantage of the SABLs instead of going through the normal procedures to get proper forest management authorities.’ And Gabriel Mollock from the Turubu Ecoforestry Forum, not happy, was forthright and said that this, ‘…is not a development, development is about people, people having to have some kind of improvement, improving their standard of living, quality of life, improving infrastructure development, those are development but looking at what is happening right now it is like ripping of our resources, tangible resources, it is more or less like you rob it. We must scrutinise these laws to ensure that people must give their free, prior, informed consent.’
Further outside Africa, that land teeming with Anacondas and crocodiles has often been invaded by foreign investors, but they aren’t going to do so easily for a long time. Brazil is now on the rise and unapologetic about its land needs. I love this; “Brazilian land must stay in the hands of Brazilians,” said the farm development minister, Guilherme Cassel. The UK Telegraph reported that massive land grabbing in Brazil set off a fierce backlash with the government subsequently passing ‘a decree limiting acreage held by foreign-owned companies.’ Brazilian authorities even went further to probe if foreign multinational companies were now using local fronts to disguise investment in Mato Grosso and Amazonia.
Even Australia is not spared in this scramble for land; its senate has had to call for an audit of foreign ownership of commercial agricultural and pastoral land, and water projects. No one with land is safe from these wealthy investment predators.
Who are these predators anyway and how are they using the land?
The appeal for land is mainly due to food insecurity worldwide versus the increasing the population. According to the World Bank, industrial and “transition” countries are losing 2.9m hectares of cultivated farmland to concrete annually. For example, ‘China is paving over its fertile belt on the Eastern seaboard, and depleting the water basin of the North China Plain for crop irrigation.’ So, the salivating investors have turned to poor countries to satisfy the growing need for land. Thus, African land grabbers are emerging from all over the world. As is by now well-known, sovereign wealth funds from the Mid-East, as well as state-entities from China, the Pacific Rim, and even India are out to acquire huge chunks of land to utilise in supplying the world’s future food needs. Western agribusiness is out in all forces using many firms listed on London’s AIM exchange. Please visit the NGO GRAIN, and farmlandgrab.com, which have both documented the stampede for African land in detail.
Yes, the very people who caused the world recession with their hedge funds are at it again. Those ‘hedge funds that struck rich ‘shorting’ US sub-prime have rotated into the next great play of our era: ‘long’ soil.’ In addition, the UK Guardian reported the world’s most prestigious university, Harvard, along with other major American universities as working deviously through British hedge funds and European financial speculators to dispossess by buying or leasing vast areas of African farmland. Obviously these deals will subsequently ‘force many thousands of people off their land.’ Yes, there you are, land acquisitions in seven African countries by Harvard University, Vanderbilt and many other US colleges have been successful because of large endowment funds they invested heavily in African land. And, the British have not yet tired of directly or indirectly colonising poor Africa as most of the money used in these land deals has been ‘channelled through London-based Emergent Asset Management, which runs one of Africa’s largest land acquisition funds, run by former JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs currency dealers.’ This is what the arrogant British who are busy chasing out black people from their cold squalid flats in poor London estates are doing back in Africa!!
The California-based Oakland Institute’s researchers indicated that Emergent’s clients in the US may have invested about $500m for buying some of the most fertile land in the expectation of making 25% returns. Oakland Institute further highlighted that whilst Chinese and Middle Eastern firms were previously identified as “grabbing” large tracts of land in developing countries to grow cheap food for home populations, it was western funds that were actually behind many of the biggest deals.
Excited about harvesting from the foreseen suffering of the world, and thus happy with his legal loot, Michael Burry, star of ‘The Big Short’ said that, “Productive agricultural land with water on site, will be very valuable in the future. And I’ve put a good amount of money into that.” African land is cheap, and its cheap and exploited labour is meant to serve and save the overfed populations of the developed countries. US land grabber in Africa, Philippe Heilberg also had this to say; “Land is cheap in Africa, but there are many reasons why it’s cheap. In many parts of the continent there is little to no infrastructure whatsoever. The frontier markets offer incredible risk-reward opportunities. Because when the growth happens it’s exponential.”
The Guardian cites Emergent as it defended the western universities’ grabbing of land by claiming that its investment deals were handled responsibly. “Yes, university endowment funds and pension funds are long-term investors,” a spokesman said. “We are investing in African agriculture and setting up businesses and employing people. We are doing it in a responsible way … The amounts are large. They can be hundreds of millions of dollars. This is not land grabbing. We want to make the land more valuable. Being big makes an impact; economies of scale can be more productive.”
As always, the devil’s bank, The World Bank is involved too! It has tripled its lending to land deals over the last decade to more than $8 billion (£5 billion). “The World Bank is in a unique position to help stop land grabs becoming one of the biggest scandals of the century,” said Barbara Stocking, the Oxfam chief executive. “Investment should be good news for developing countries not lead to greater poverty, hunger and hardship.”
It is no surprise then that investment in African land has doubled in some years with the increase of food prices. Subsequently, Gulf States joined Asian tiger economies by investing in ventures that would secure food and energy supplies through direct investment. Many investors; SinoLatin Capital, Goldman Sachs, Harvest Capital, or Berkshire Hathaway got involved in the stampede for African land. Thinking ahead and around the new laws; in 2010 Warren Buffett was exploring his $400m venture in soya and sugar with a Brazilian partner.
Pressed by the country’s bishops, Argentina is drawing up its own law. More than 7% of national territory is in the hands of foreigners with the Benetton brothers in possession of 900,000 hectares of Patagonia, some on disputed Mapuche tribal land. George Soros has holdings, as is CNN’s Ted Turner, and currency trader Joe Lewis, who consequently turned himself into a public enemy when he blocked public access to the majestic Hidden Lake.
Oxfam leads in opposing land grabbing
Generally, and alarmingly so, the trend is to grow cash crops and biofuels on this land which inevitably leaves local populations starving. To worsen matters, some of these African countries ‘have negotiated the right to export all production, even if a famine strikes the host country.’ It is indicated that three fifths of land foreign investors buy in developing nations is used for export produce which does not serve the indigenous population. I recall how in 1992 when it was reported that Zimbabwe was exporting its meagre maize harvest as the country endured one of the worst drought seasons it had yet experienced since independence.
Not surprising, it is again foreigners taking a lead to oppose the doings of foreign investors and our greedy populations. Oxfam has now taken the lead in opposing this land grab and the nature of their investments. As stated above, Oxfam asked the World Bank to stop funding such investment. Politicians and investors scream loudly they are creating employment in Africa. Is that true? They all cite that Africa’ strongest trends in economic renaissance over the last decade is due to these investments whilst The World bank states that to stop the investments ‘would do nothing to help reduce the instances of abusive practices and would likely deter responsible investors willing to apply our high standards….Now, more than ever, the world needs to increase investment in agriculture, which is two to four times more effective in raising incomes among the very poor than growth in other sectors.” “There are many foreigners who don’t buy to produce, but rather to position themselves in places with water, mineral resources and hydrocarbons,” said Pablo Orsolini, an Argentinean sponsor of the legislation. It is reported that the amount of land bought by foreigners ‘in Argentina has almost tripled in the last 10 years, a phenomenon that is spreading to areas that are rich in natural resources and is affecting small towns that are finding themselves enclosed within the domains of large landholders.’ How can this be right? The very countries that spew garbage about democracy have no respect for others. In 2010, ten people died in food riots in Mozambique as a result of Russia’s grain export ban. With the world’s wheat prices having doubled since June 2010, the World Bank indicated that the number of people starving has shot up from 830m to more than 1bn over the past three years. The solution of feeding those in developed countries is to be found in ‘surplus’ land in under-developed and developing countries.
The World Bank, tacitly in agreement with Oxfam and others opposing land grab, is also getting concerned about this ferocious foreign investments. According to its 2010 report; ‘‘New World Bank Report Sees Growing Global Demand for Farmland’’ “Large land acquisitions come at a high cost. The veil of secrecy that often surrounds these deals must be lifted.” The Bank warns of a “resource curse” that may enrich the elite whilst abandoning wreckage behind. Proposals are not properly screened. Peasants are forcibly displaced. Communal grazing lands are closed off. Some investors manipulate opinion with a media blitz of false promises. Nothing has been produced so far on almost 80pc of the land purchased. Benefits are often minimal, “even non-existent”. Surely our African elites, some sitting in these world boards, do not need others to tell them that this land grabbing is instead not benefiting their poor folks. The World Bank is rightly alarmed by these investments as it ‘questions whether it is wise to divert half of the world’s increased output of maize and wheat over the next decade into bio-fuels to meet government “mandates”. This sets precedents as surely other crops will soon face the same fate.
And the most essential point to consider is that the investors are growing for export whilst treating African people like trash in their own land! The investors have no economic or moral empathy for Africa. Where are African leaders like the late Capt. Thomas Sankara who had the people’s love if Oxfam has to fight this global battle alone? Whilst support for Oxfam has been coming from the Network of Farmers and Agricultural Producers Organisations of West Africa and the Regional Platform of Farmers’ Organisation in Central Africa, Save the Children and UNICEF, our honest prominent sons and daughters need to get their act together and help secure the future of our children.
What can be done to stop land grabs
I know there are fundis out there who know about this issue and can offer better solutions to stop what is currently happening. I do not advocate for total cessation of land acquisitions, but these have to be well balanced to carter for the needs of the local populations. Whilst beneficial projects are needed towards stopping African and world-wide food crisis, bringing in investment, know-how, and transport links, creating jobs, etc; they essentially should be serving the local people foremost. African governments need to have water-tight legislation to protect their poor citizens from foreign investors and the local elites. You can imagine what would have happened if the government had given title deeds to resettled poor farmers; very few would still be on the land. The rich would have bought it all and sold it to foreign investors!
If foreign universities are buying our land, why cant African institutions do the same and seek investment partnerships? Maybe I have missed this, but I have not heard of Zimbabwean universities or colleges applying for repossessed agricultural land, yet their officials have been privately grabbing this land. How about the Diaspora? Are there no opportunities for investing in your country in this area?
I also think we need legislation that ensures local councils and communities are involved in any land investments by foreign investors to secure the local people’s interests, hence the essence of devolution.
We can also do with independent boards that can deal with massive investments and land sales to ensure it benefits the local community and country as a whole, and that it is not for prospecting only. The civic society need to vigorously oppose corrupt land grabs by foreigners and the local elite such as is represented by the Chombos, Mpofus, Mujurus, Munangagwas, Chiyangwas and others of Zimbabwe.